


Layers Of Untrue Selves

by TheaPavlov



Category: Black Widow (Comics), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Awesome Clint Barton, Chronic Illness, Chronic Pain, Clint Barton & Natasha Romanov Friendship, Clint Barton Feels, Clint Barton Has Issues, Clint Barton Is a Good Bro, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Grief/Mourning, Hurt, Hurt/Comfort, Kid Natasha Romanov, Major injuries, Marvel Universe, Minor Clint Barton/Natasha Romanov, Minor Injuries, Natasha Romanov & Tony Stark Friendship, Natasha Romanov Feels, Natasha Romanov Has Issues, Natasha Romanov Is Not A Robot, Natasha Romanov Is a Good Bro, Natasha Romanov Needs a Hug, One Shot, Past Bucky Barnes/Natasha Romanov, Protective Clint Barton, Protective Natasha Romanov, Red Room (Marvel), Steve Rogers & Natasha Romanov Friendship
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-16
Updated: 2020-08-09
Packaged: 2020-10-20 04:01:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 22
Words: 32,682
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20668976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheaPavlov/pseuds/TheaPavlov
Summary: She stared up at the ceiling as Madame put the other girls to bed. She was always afraid to go to sleep, that’s what happens when every night you're plagued by nightmares. Memories, she wished she could forget. As Madame left and the room was filled with darkness, she closed her eyes, listening to the soft whimpers of some of the weaker girls. A lullaby that reminded her she wasn’t alone.(One-shots based on prompts)





	1. Chapter 1

Natasha took down the last of her opponents with a swift kick to the neck. As he crumpled to the ground she turned around to see how Clint was doing. Unfortunately, it looked like he was going to need a hand. She pulled out her gun and quickly let off 2 shots, getting rid of the guy on his right. Leaving Clint room to take down the other.   
“I had that” Clint said, wincing as he tucked his gun back into his belt. 

“Sure you did” She answered. She looked at Clint, searching for any sort of life threatening injuries he may have acquired during the fight. A habit she’s picked up since Clint seems to have a knack for getting injured. He looked fine except for a few cuts and he seemed to be walking with a bit of a limp. Left ankle. It was always the left. She looked up to meet his eyes and saw that they were filled with worry. And she knew why, but she didn’t need him worrying over her. Not when they were in the middle of a mission. 

“Tash” He said, stepping closer to her. 

“It’s fine, I’m fine, I promise” She said, turning around and walking back down the corridor. Trying not to let how much pain she was in show in her walk. During the fight she had gotten distracted and a knife had somehow found its way into her side, right below her rib cage. She knew it hadn’t hit anything important inside, so the main concern was blood loss. 

“Natasha, stop” Clint said, a hint of anger in his voice. She kept walking, she didn’t want to be worried over. Why? She didn’t know. Was it because she didn’t want to seem weak? Or because she didn’t know how to react to someone actually caring if she was in pain. No one ever did when she was a child, so why would they now. No. She couldn’t be thinking about these things right now. They were on a mission. And missions always came first. She was so deep in thought she didn’t even notice Clint firmly grab her hand, not letting her go another step. 

“Nat, this is just a recon mission, it’s okay if we stop and get you to medical.” He said, his voice soft and filled with worry. 

She didn’t turn to face him. She couldn’t. She didn’t want him to see the fear or pain in her eyes. She was amazing at hiding how she really felt. But it was always harder with Clint. She thought of ripping her hand out of his grasp and continuing on her own. But she was getting dizzy and knew she couldn’t. Not without him. 

“Please Natasha, your bleeding really bad.” He paused and she heard his voice crack. “We have to alert Phil.”

Her vision was swimming and she could hear her heartbeat drumming in her ears. But for some reason she just couldn’t turn to face him. She didn’t want to seem weak. Which was ridiculous because this was Clint. This was her best friend, her partner. She didn’t know what to do, what to think. She was frozen. 

“Clint.” She started, making sure that no emotion was displayed in her voice. “I’m okay, nothing is wrong, we have to finish the mission.” Her legs felt weak and she was so, so dizzy but she couldn’t let him know. She had to stay standing. She had too. She had too. But she was so tired. She felt her knees buckle and Clint guide her to the ground so her back was up against the wall. She had lost too much blood and both of them knew it. And even though she hated it, she had to let him help her. 

Clint pressed a button on his comm, “Agent Romanoff is down we need immediate extraction” He said knowing that Phil had their location thanks to the tracker included in the comm. 

She had deteriorated a lot faster than she had first predicted. Maybe the knife had hit something important. She focused on Clint’s face as he unzipped the top of her suit. And pulled it down to her waist, exposing her sports bra as well as the wound. She looked down at her stomach and could already see a bluish purple bruise developing over top of her left rib cage. Nice, definitely at least one broken rib there. The stab wound on her right side was a lot deeper and longer than she had thought. Blood seeping out, covering her side in red. This was bad. She looked back up at Clint and leaned her head against the wall, her neck could no longer keep it up. Clint firmly pressed a hand to her side to try and stop the bleeding. Even though it hurt she kept a straight face, not wanting to panic Clint. But her vision was getting fuzzy and even though she wasn’t moving, the room was spinning. 

“Hey Nat, stay with me okay, the med team will be here soon, we just gotta hold on till then.” Clint told her, keeping a firm hand on her side. The bleeding was coming out slower, but still not stopping. She knew that she had to see the med team and she knew that all they were going to do was help her but she was afraid. She was afraid of the needles and everyone looking at her and worrying over her. Of course the only person who knew that was Clint. He knew that in the Red Room, when you went to medical, you were punished.

Getting hurt was a weakness, and every student knew that weakness meant death. So no one went unless they had to. And if you showed up with a non life threatening injury you were shot on the spot for not being able to deal with the pain. So ya, She hated everything to do with going to the SHIELD Medical Wing. She knew they wouldn’t hurt her, but the fear was still there. She opened her mouth to ask Clint to stay with her when they came. But she couldn’t get any words out. Her mouth was so dry. 

“Hey, hey, I know, I’ll stay with you when they come I promise.” He said, lifting up his other hand to rest it on her cheek. She calmed at his touch, thankful that he knew what she was trying to say. 

“Your so pale.” He said. Taking his hand off her cheek and pressing it on top of his other to try and add more pressure. She wished he had kept his hand on her face, it made her feel safe. She felt guilty though, seeing the fear in his eyes. She didn’t want him to be afraid, especially because of her. It had been her fault she got stabbed. She should have been more careful. 

“Phil says it should only be 5 minutes till they land, that means they should be here really soon okay, we took care of most of the thugs so it shouldn’t take them that long.” Clint said, plastering a fake smile onto his face. She hated that.

Her vision was foggy and she was struggling to focus on Clint, a tell tale sign that she was going to lose her hold on consciousness. Something she couldn’t do, it left her vulnerable. And she hated being vulnerable. It only got her hurt. Her eyelids felt so heavy and it took all the strength she had not to let them fall shut. She saw Clint’s mouth move and heard sounds come out but she couldn’t make sense of the words. It was like she was underwater. A feeling she was all too familiar with. 

As she struggled to stay awake, she wondered if that was what she really wanted. She was fighting so hard to stay awake, but why. She was just so tired of fighting. Fighting others, fighting the dark thoughts that threatened to cloud her mind. She was raised to fight, to be a machine. A few years back when she joined SHIELD, she thought she could be normal, find some friends and have a real life. But recently she had started to realize that no matter what she did, she would always be the machine they had trained her to be. Not some hero, not an Avenger. A Black Widow. She just wanted it all to be over. So she let her eyes slide closed, knowing that she could’ve held onto reality if she wanted to. But she didn’t. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

She sat on her bed, wearing an identical white nightgown to the other 15 six year old girls in the room. She waited on the edge just staring ahead, waiting for Madame to come and lay her down and attach the handcuffs. Just like she had done every night, for as long as she could remember. This was just life. She didn’t know any other. She didn’t know that it wasn’t normal to be handcuffed to a bed.

She stiffened as she heard the click of Madame’s heels coming around to her bed. Not daring to look into her eyes as she put her hand on her shoulders and laid her down in the bed, and draped a blanket over her. Without saying a word, Madame took her hand and fastened the ring of metal around her tiny wrist. She hated how it bit into her skin. And it was cold, so cold. Madame fastened the other ring around her bedpost, locking her arm into the place it would rest for the next 8 hours. 

She stared up at the ceiling as Madame put the other girls to bed. She was always afraid to go to sleep, that’s what happens when every night you're plagued by nightmares. Memories, she wished she could forget. As Madame left and the room was filled with darkness, she closed her eyes, listening to the soft whimpers of some of the weaker girls. A lullaby that reminded her she wasn’t alone. 

\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The first thought that came to her mind when she “woke up” was how much her head hurt. It took her a second to realize where she was. Medical. She didn’t open her eyes for a few reasons. First she didn’t want anyone to know she was awake, and second she knew the brightness would hurt her eyes and just make her headache worse. If that was possible. She was laying down in a bed and could hear beeping all around her. Her body ached, it felt as though every muscle was made of iron. It concerned her how hard it felt to breathe. As if bricks were placed over her chest. That's when she realized she had an oxygen mask over her mouth. Not the first time she’s woken up with one of those on. The final thing she realized was a hand holding on to hers. She could tell exactly who it was. Clint. He had kept his promise and stayed with her. She knew he would. 

Even though she didn’t want too, she slowly opened her eyes. Resisting the urge to shut them as the bright white light seemed to sting her eyes. Clint didn’t notice her open her eyes which gave her the time to look around the room. A habit to take in her surroundings everywhere she was, she could never let her guard. Another thing the Red Room had beat into her.

It was a pretty plain room, white walls, tile floor, nothing special. She was surprised to see not only Clint in the room but Steve and Tony as well. Something she hadn’t expected. Both Tony and Steve were asleep in their chairs which is why they didn’t notice her wake up. Something she was thankful for. She looked over to Clint who was in a chair right beside her bed. His hands over top of hers, resting his head on the bed. His eyes were closed but she could tell that he wasn’t asleep by the pattern of his breathing. She wondered how long she had been out. It could only have been hours, or it could have been days. Or even weeks. But there was no way of finding out without asking someone. She gently moved her thumb in circles over Clint’s, letting him know she was awake. Within a second of her doing so his head shot up. 

“Hey Nat.” He said quietly. He stood up and brought a hand to her face. He looked terrible. Like he hadn’t slept in days. He had bags under his eyes, and they looked swollen from crying. Not a good sign, Clint isn’t one to cry easily.

“You need to shave” She said. She was surprised at how her voice sounded. It sounded broken and it was almost a whisper. He chuckled but it wasn’t sincere, she could tell.   
“How long” She asked, almost afraid to know the answer. And Clint’s reaction didn’t help. He looked away and she could see the battle in his mind. Contemplating whether or not to tell her the truth. 

“Clint” She repeated. “How long”. He looked back at her and rested his hand on her forehead. 

“It’s been 12 days since the mission.” He said. She was shocked. 12 days was the longest she’d been out in a long time. Definitely a strange amount of time for what she believed was a simple stab wound. But the 12 days she was out and how hard it felt to breathe, it must have been way worse. 

“I’ll tell you more when Fury comes okay, we still have to give a mission report.” Clint continued. “He wanted to wait till you woke up, I don’t know why.”  
She didn’t either. It was weird. If one of them was hurt or unconscious usually the other quickly gave him the report the day of. Just another thing to add to the list of concerns. Clint turned towards the sleeping Steve and Tony. 

“Hey guys, she’s awake” he said, loud enough to cause Tony to wake with a start.

“Like awake awake?” Tony asked as he stood up from his chair.

Awake awake? What did he mean by that she wondered. Despite how she felt, she smiled as they both walked over to her. She was glad they were there. As they got closer she could see the exhaustion on both of their faces. They didn’t look as bad as Clint did, but close. It almost looked like none of them had slept much the 12 days she was out. Why were they so worried. She didn’t understand. 

“Why do you all look so tired, you all look worse than I do” She asked. The boys all looked at each other. But didn’t answer. 

“I’m going to call Fury” Clint finally said. He stroked her head one last time before leaving the room. She was so confused. Everyone was acting so strange. What was wrong? What had happened?

“You didn’t answer” She said, making sure to hide the worry in her voice. Steve and Tony looked at each other again. Trying to decide what to see to her. See hated it. The secrecy. Why couldn’t they just tell her what was going on? She grew impatient. “Tony why did you say is she awake awake, what did you mean.” She said, her voice angry. 

“Nat, these past 12 days, you’ve been waking up screaming, and talking in russian, alot” Tony said. “Nightmares or memories, I don’t know.”

She looked at him, not caring if he saw the horror on her face or not. That’s why they had been acting so strange. That’s why they looked so tired. That’s why her throat hurt so much. The only person who had witnessed her nightmares was Clint, and even he got shaken up by the intensity of them. Of how afraid she is when she has them. She was careful about never falling asleep around the others. Just in case. She didn’t want to scare them. But that's exactly what she did. And she felt horrible about it.


	2. Chapter 2: Bloody Hands (Preview

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Preview of a bigger story to come, really excited to write the rest of it, let me know if you like this one. Prompt was bloody hands.

She sat on the edge of their double bed. Just staring at the wall in front of her. Looking at how the wallpaper peeled away, the stains. It wasn’t the nicest motel room but it was good enough for her and Clint. They wouldn’t be here that long anyway. They were both in Russia. Something she wasn’t fond of, mostly because of all the memories that came back when she was there. It was so much harder to file them away. Push them back so she didn’t have to think about them. And even if she did she couldn’t let anyone know. Not even Clint.

He was in the shower now and she knew she should be doing something, anything really other then stare at the wall in front of her. She could be getting their supplies ready, doing more research or even sleep. But she couldn’t stop thinking about the mission. Fury had told them about a child ring that was set up in Russia, with ties that seemed to be pointing to the Red Room. The place that trained her. Raised her. He had given her the option to sit this one out since it was so close to her. But she said she’d go. Something she was starting to regret now. She knew that if she got trapped in her head she would be no help to Clint. And she couldn’t let that happen. She couldn’t let herself get trapped in her head. But that was exactly what she was doing now. 

She remembered when she killed for the first time, how she did it. How it felt. She remembered the first time she’d been raped. How much it hurt, how afraid she felt. How much she didn’t want it to happen. She remembered ballet classes. Learning different languages. Learning how to kill with anything. Being beaten into not feeling. It haunted her. The things that happened to her. The things she had done. 

She was so deep in thought she didn’t even notice that the water had stopped running. If she did she would have pretended to be doing something other then stare at a wall. She heard Clint say something, but she didn’t know what. She knew she should turn her gaze towards him or show some sign that she heard him. But she couldn’t make herself move. She heard him move over to her. He put a hand on her shoulder, snapping her out of the weird frozen state she was in. 

“Nat, you okay?” He asked kneeling down in front of her, moving his hand from her shoulder to her knee. He was wearing a t-shirt and sweatpants, his hair still wet from the shower. 

She nodded, remembering that she couldn’t let Clint know how she was feeling. It would only worry him. She stood up abruptly and went over to her side of the bed and lay down. Her head resting against the pillow. She faced away from Clint. Unable to look him in the eyes. Because if she did, he would see the emotion in them. 

“Come on, it’s late and we have to get up early tomorrow” She choked out, pleased with how convincingly okay she sounded. She just hoped Clint could see through it. If he did, he didn’t show any sign of it as he turned off the light and climbed into bed beside her, his back to her. She kept her hand on her gun under the pillow just in case they had some surprise visitors. She let herself drift to sleep, wishing that she could have peace from her memories for at least a little while. 

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

When she woke up Clint was no longer beside her. Instead he was already dressed and putting together his weapons, and hers as well. It was rare that she woke up after Clint. Especially so long after him. Even though she had been sleeping long enough she felt exhausted. Her eyes felt dry and all she wanted to do was close them again. But of course she couldn’t so instead she rolled over so that she was facing Clint. 

“Morning” She said. 

“Hey” he replied, turning around to face her, loading her gun. “Go get ready we have to leave in a few minutes.”

“Why didn’t you wake me up, you know I can get my own weapons ready.” She said playfully as she got to her feet. 

“I know.” he said with a slight chuckle, “You just looked like you needed some more sleep, that’s all.” 

She nodded and grabbed her catsuit from the bedside table. She headed over to the tiny bathroom and shut the door behind her. She slid off the leggings and sweatshirt she wore to bed. Wishing she could just keep them on and climb back in. But she knew she couldn’t. She looked at herself in the mirror. Standing there in her underwear and sports bra, she looked weak, broken. She was paler than usual, her fiery red hair spilled over her shoulders like blood. She noticed how hollow her eyes were. How empty they looked. She saw the scars all over her body. Given to her by others, and herself. She didn’t look like the Black Widow, an Avenger. She didn’t look like Natasha Romanoff. She looked like a scared little girl, A girl who had been beaten. A girl who had been forced to kill. She looked like Natalia Romanova. And that scared her. 

She ripped her gaze from the girl in the mirror and slid on her catsuit, swinging open the bathroom door and getting out of there as fast as she could. She wanted to scream, she wanted to cry. She wanted to tell Clint how much she was hurting. But she kept all the emotion out of her face. This was a mission, this wasn’t about her it was about the children they needed to save. Nothing could get in the way of that. 

“Let’s get going” She said to Clint as she started to put all of her weapons into their usual hiding places. 

“Nat, are you sure your okay, I know that this is tough for you. Being back in Russia, and having to go break up a child ring linked to the Red Room. It’s alright to not be okay. You can tell me” Clint said abruptly.

Shit. He could see right through her act. He was the only one that could. She couldn’t look at him. She didn’t want to see the worry in his eyes that she knew was there. Instead she put the last knife in place and stalked out the door. She heard Clint follow her and was thankful her didn’t say anything else. This was a mission. She repeated that over and over in her head as they made there way to the warehouse that the children were being kept, being very careful not to be caught. 

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It took them about 2 hours to get to the warehouse. She and Clint had split up once they reached the warehouse. The plan was to save the children, capture the people doing this to them and take them all back to SHIELD, no casualties. That should be easy for 2 of the best assassins in the world, right? But something didn’t feel right to her. It was a lot emptier than expected. She couldn’t hear any voices. There were no armed guards. Nothing. She tried to shake the feeling, trying to focus instead on clearing each room she passed. She had cleared 4 already, nothing in them except for a few boxes. Maybe they're intel had been wrong. 

She pushed open the door to the next room, gun drawn. She expected to find more empty boxes. But instead their were bits of rope on the ground. As well as blood. She felt a shiver go through her. She stepped into the room to get a closer look. There was blood everywhere. She picked up one of the ropes but immediately dropped it. It was soaked in fresh blood. She looked at her hands, now covered in blood. The blood was fresh. So someone was definitely here. She only hoped that the blood wasn’t one of the children’s, though she knew in the back of her mind that it had to be. She wished she could alert Clint or ask him if he had found anything, but they hadn’t brought their comms. A stupid mistake. 

She left that room and turned down a hallway. Wiping her hands on her pant leg. But they were already stained red. She stopped. At the end of the hallway was a door, and it was slightly open. Through the crack she could see that the lights were off. She knew it right away. This was a trap. They had to know that they were coming. This was the Red Room. It shouldn’t be this easy, unless they wanted it to be. Her mind raced, trying to figure out what to do. But she already knew the only choice she had, she just didn’t want to do it. She knew she had to walk right into their trap, it was the only way to save the children, if they were even there. 

She took a deep breath and walked towards the door. She was just about to put her hand on the doorknob when she heard a voice say her name from behind her. She spun around and pointed her gun at the source, panic shooting through her. 

“Hey, hey it’s just me” Clint whispered, with his hands in the air. 

She pointed her gun away from Clint, giving him a glare for sneaking up on her like that.   
“Is it just me who’s getting a weird feeling” He whispered, coming closer to her, making sure to stay out of view of whoever might be behind the door. 

“It’s a trap, did you see the room with the ropes and blood” She asked, keeping her eyes on the crack in the door, waiting to see any sort of movement, but she didn’t. 

“Ya, what are we going to do?” He asked her. 

She felt his gaze on her, looking for answers. She kept her eyes on the door. This was a mission. This was about the children. Not her. If she had to walk into a trap and get killed to save them. Then so be it. 

“We fall into it.” She answered and put her hand on the door knob.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave a comment, it really helps me!


	3. Insomnia

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clint finds out Natasha is having trouble sleeping and he helps her

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry this one is a bit short

(Clints POV)

He was laying in his bed at the Avengers tower, reading a book Steve had given to him. Pretty boring so far. But he wasn’t going to tell Steve that. He couldn’t quite focus on the storyline anyways, he was to busy thinking about his family. It had been almost 2 weeks since he was last home. But the Avengers needed him right now, and Laura understood that. He was thankful that she did. Just another reason why he loved her so much. 

It was a little after 12am, so when he heard a soft knock at his door he was surprised. He put down the book and got up to open it. On the other side of the door was his partner, his best friend. Who else would be knocking at his door at this time? 

“Hey,” He said opening the door wider to let her in. But she stayed right where she stood. 

“Wanna spare” She asked, quietly.

He looked at her. She looked exhausted. There were dark, purple bags under her eyes and he noticed that she almost looked scared. Something was wrong, and he was going to find out what it was. Even if it meant sparing at midnight when all he really wanted to do was go to bed.   
“Sure,” He said, stepping out into the dark hallway and closing his door behind him. Natasha turned around without saying anything else and made her way towards the gym. This wasn’t the first time something like this had happened, and it definitely wasn’t going to be the last. With all the abuse she had suffered as a child, really up until a few years ago, He knew that she couldn’t handle it on her own. Even if she thought she could. And he was glad to help her through all the trauma. He had held her as she cried, helped her through her nightmares and flashbacks, kept her secrets. And she had done the same for him. He trusted her and she trusted him. And he knew that her trust was extremely hard to get. 

He followed as she opened the door to the gym and turned on the lights. Tony had really outdone himself with the room. It had everything you could think of. Definitely one of his favorite spots in the tower. They made their way over to the mats in the middle of the room. 

“How we gonna do this,” He asked. His arm behind his head, attempting at a quick stretch. He didn’t feel like pulling any muscles today. 

“Just fight me” Natasha replied, getting into a fighting position. 

“You sure? Not even a point system?” He said, attempting a joke. Normally Natasha would laugh even if the joke wasn’t funny. But she didn’t. Her face betraying no emotion. His smile faded and he got into position. As soon as he did Natasha rushed him. Grabbing him and slamming him to the ground. He kicked out her leg from underneath her and pinned her to the mat. 

Normally they were pretty evenly matched. He might even admit that she was better than him. But tonight he took her down quickly. Much too quickly. She wasn’t fighting with the usual strength and agility making it easy for Clint to overpower her. She stood up again as Clint let go of her, looking angry. Not with him, with herself. This time she waited for him to make the first move. He surprised by faking a kick to her left and instead of kicking her on the right side. Any other day she would have seen it coming, but not tonight. He felt bad as his foot collided with her ribcage. She shook it off quickly and lunged at him. But he ducked out of the way and she fell to the floor. This is very unlike her. She was fighting like some hydra thug. Not her usual self. It worried him. 

After Clint pinned her to the mat for the 5th time she stopped fighting. She didn’t get up, just layed on the mat where he had pinned her. Clint got off her quickly, worrying that he had hurt her. 

“Hey Nat, you okay,” He asked, crouching over her. She was shaking and Clint could see tears in her eyes. She put her hands over her face for a few seconds. When she brought them back down the tears were no longer there. Like she had put on a mask. Clint hated it when she did that. 

“Stop, don’t do that, you don’t have to hide from me,” He said softly, helping her into a sitting position. She wouldn’t look him in the eye, just kept her gaze on the mat in front of her. He put his hand on her back, trying to give some sort of comfort. She just looked so tired, it scared him. 

“When was the last time you slept, and you be honest with me,” He said, lifting her chin up so that she was looking him in the eyes. She just looked at him and didn’t answer. 

“When” he repeated, a bit more forcefully this time. He was going to get an answer. 

“two days ago,” She said. She looked defeated. And he knew why. It had been a while since her nightmares had made her scared to sleep. She was probably feeling ashamed that she was having problems with them again. But she didn’t have to feel ashamed. He just wanted her to know that. 

“You can tell me your not weak for letting yourself cry or be scared. You don’t have to hide.” He said softly, pulling her into a hug. She melted into him, resting her head against his chest. 

“I can’t sleep, I’m afraid of what I’ll see when I close my eyes.” She admitted to him. She made it sound like she had failed. But it wasn’t her fault. He just wished he could somehow make her understand that. 

“I know, it’s okay. I’ve got you” He said, pulling her closer. When she had first come to America she was this broken young woman. Scared to show others who she was, how she felt. It took years to gain her trust. She had lived with him and Laura for a while. She was like a child to them. Even though she was almost 20 years younger than him, she was his best friend. He didn’t want her to be hurting or be scared. 

“Come on,” He said, getting to his feet, picking her up in his arms. She held onto him like he was the only thing keeping her from drowning. And in some ways he was. When her dark thoughts and memories threatened to swallow her, he pulled her out. He left the gym, turning off the lights and shutting the door behind him. He looked down at Natasha and saw that her eyes were closed. Finally, all the hours without sleep had caught up to her. 

He carefully made his way back to his room, not wanting to wake her. As he walked through the dark tower, he felt at peace. Like it was just him wandering the world. That's why he liked the night so much. It was like no one was around but him. There were no sounds. No cars, no people. The only sound he could hear was his own steps.

When he got into his room he lay Natasha on the bed, spreading the covers over her. People always say how you look at peace when you're asleep. But she doesn’t. She looks scared, maybe even angry. Clint sat down on the bed next to her, cradling her head in his lap. He could see her calm at his touch even though she was asleep. 

He looked at the clock. 2:47 am. Even though he was tired he felt the need to stay awake for Natasha. At least for tonight. He wanted her to feel safe. So he picked up the boring book that Steve had given him and actually tried to care about the storyline. And that night, for the first time in weeks, Natasha was spared from her nightmares.


	4. Chapter 4: "No, stop" Part 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: a dream of the red room. Nothing graphic but things are hinted at. Part 2 will be posted in the next day or 2

She sat on the edge of her bed, in the pitch dark. Staring out the window at the nightlife of New York. She watched the lights of all the cars and buildings. Noticed when some lights in the condos turned off, their owners heading to bed. Something she should be doing. She hadn’t been sleeping very well lately. Not more than 3 or 4 hours each night. Being plagued by nightmares made it difficult to sleep. She would never admit to anybody that she was afraid to close her eyes. She had barely begun to admit it to herself. She felt stupid being afraid to sleep, she wasn’t a child. But in some ways, she was. 

She got up off the edge of the bed and went to her closet to change into something more comfortable to sleep in. She always changed in the dark if she could. She didn’t know exactly why she did it, guess she just didn’t want to see herself. 

Once she had finished getting changed, she climbed into her bed. It was soft. Almost too soft. Sometimes she felt as if she was going to sink into it and disappear. A feeling she was often thankful for. Other times it felt as if the bed was going to swallow her whole, suffocate her. But she only really felt like that after long missions, when a soft bed was something few and far between. So it always felt strange coming back and sleeping in her own.

She curled up into a ball, pulling the thick blanket over top of her. She shut her eyes and tried to calm herself. Deep breathe in. Hold it. Deep breathe out. Just like Clint had shown her. She did this over and over. It worked a bit. But it didn’t stop the thoughts that were coming through her head. That she wasn’t good enough. That she didn’t deserve the people around her. That she was nothing more than the monster they made her. She thought about these things until she fell asleep. A tear dried on her cheek. 

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Natalia do you understand me” Madame B said. An iron grip on her chin. Forcing her head up so that she had to meet Madame’s eyes. They were grey and cold. Evil looking. Even though she was afraid she forced herself to answer.

“Yes Madame” she replied. She was surprised by the sound of her own voice. It sounded quiet and scratchy from the unuse. Madame let go of her chin, leaving little indents where her nails had dug in. 

“Now go be a good little girl.” Madame said. 

Natalia turned around and slowly walked towards the door of the room she hated most. She always saw other older girls going in and coming out. Their faces pale. Some showed horror, others were crying. She knew those were the weak ones. When the strong girls came out their faces showed no emotion at all. Nothing that would betray the events that occured in that room. 

She was only 10 years old. But Madame considered this the prime age to start her training. Not training in fighting or torture methods, she had already started that training when she was 4 years old. No this was the training need for mission that required more than just fighting. When she needed to use her body to get what she wanted. Or should she say get what Madame wanted. Her body isn't her own so she couldn’t think about it that way. She was an object. A tool of the Red Room. She had no place in the world. 

She neared the door and stood in front of it for a moment. She couldn’t bring herself to turn the handle and open it. She had heard of what happens behind that door from the other girls who had gone before her. And had come back to their dormitory in tears. But she was strong. She wouldn’t cry no matter what. She had to prove to Madame that she was the best. 

She reached up and turned the doorknob, opened the door and stepped inside. She wasn’t prepared for what she saw. The room was dark, only lit up by a lamp on a table beside the bed. A carpet on the floor. It was pretty small, those being the only items in the room. Except the man on the bed. Fully naked. 

She closed the door behind her. But didn’t take any steps forward. Instead she pressed her back against the door. She had never seen this man before. He looked younger than her other trainers. He had long, brown hair and most noticeably a metal arm. A red star painted on the side. Soviet. 

She stayed frozen against the door for a minute or so when the man spoke. 

“Clothes off, then come and sit on the bed.” He said. His voice was rough. She was afraid. 

But she had to follow his orders. She wasn’t weak. She could do this. She slowly undressed and dropped her uniform onto the floor. Goosebumps covered her. It was so cold in the room. She wished she could just climb under the covers and cocoon herself in the blanket. Hide from the world. But that wasn’t going to happen. 

She walked over the  
bed and sat down on the edge. As far away from the man as possible. She didn’t even look at him. She couldn’t. They were quiet for some time. The man didn’t move from his spot and neither did she. She kept her eyes on the floor, not daring to say anything to him. 

“I don’t like doing this you know” the man finally said. Though he still didn’t look at her. “I have to follow orders just like you.” That was all he said. 

She stiffened as she felt him get off the bed and move towards her. She shut her eyes and went into her mind. She thought about the flowers that grew outside. The snow that fell so thickly. She thought about everything except for what the man was doing. She could get through this. She was strong. She was marble.


	5. Chapter 4: "No, stop" Part 2

Clint’s POV

He woke with a start to pounding at his door. Startled he jumped out of bed and grabbed his bow from its spot next to his side table. He moved slowly towards the door.

“Who is it?” He called, bow at the ready. 

“Clint it’s just me!” 

He immediately relaxed and dropped his bow to the ground once he heard Steve’s voice. He went to open the door, slightly annoyed at how Steve had woken him up. 

“Jesus Steve you almost-” Clint started but he was cut off. 

“I don’t know what’s wrong, Tony and I were just in the kitchen and we heard her screaming but we can’t get her door open, Tony’s up there now.” Steve said, panic on his face. 

He didn’t need to hear anymore, he pushed past Steve and ran down the stairs towards her floor. Steve right behind him. He knew exactly what was wrong, and he needed to be there to help her out of it. As soon as he and Steve got to her floor he could hear her screams. Some in Russian, some not. 

“No, stop!” 

“Пожалуйста, это больно”

“Madame! Madame!”

Clint felt his heart skip a beat. These were different then usual. The things she was saying. How afraid her screams sounded. It sounded like she was in pain. Like she thought she was going to die. She screamed for Madame like a child calls for her mother. Whatever she was dreaming about must be one of her worst memories. Things she hadn’t told anyone. Not even him. 

He ran to her door as fast as his feet would carry him. Tony was already there, doing his best to override the passcode locking her door. 

“Please stop!”

“Мама, Мама”

“It hurts!”

Clint frantically pushed Tony out of the way of the passcode panel. He quickly tried to type in the code Natasha had given him to open her door in case of an emergency. In his rush he typed it in wrong the first time, this angered him, he didn’t want Natasha to be afraid for a second longer. After he tried again the door slide open. 

“Stay here” He said to Steve and Tony. He knew they cared but Natasha would kill him if he let them in. These nightmares were something only he and Laura knew about, she had tried so hard to keep them a secret from the team. She didn’t want them to think she was weak. Like they ever would. 

He ran to the door of her bedroom and stopped. She was thrashing around in the bed. Like she was trying to get away from someone holding her down. Tears were covering her face, she was sobbing. 

Before he could move he felt Steve and Tony come in behind him. Apparently choosing to ignore his instruction. 

He turned to them angrily, “I said stay outside, go back!” It came out a little harsher than he meant. 

He rushed forward to Natasha’s side, flipping on the lamp next to her. He put his hands on her shoulders and attempted to shake her awake. Though she only started to cry harder and struggle against him. 

“Natasha it’s me, it’s Clint.” He said loudly. She needed to know that she was safe, he wasn’t going to hurt her. 

“Your not there. Your here in your bedroom and I’m right beside you.” He cried shaking her harder. She finally opened her eyes. He saw the fear in them. She looked like a scared child. 

“Clint” She cried out, reaching out for him. 

He scooped her up and held her close to him. She held on tightly and sobbed into his chest. 

“Your safe, your safe.” He repeated over and over again. Rocking ever so slightly. He hadn’t seen her like this in a very long time. He wondered briefly what could have triggered this to happen. 

She sobbed harder. And Clint felt tears start to form in his own eyes. It was hard to see her like this. He would give anything to be able to go back to when she was a child and save her from that horrible place. Save her from all the trauma. 

“Clint, please make it stop.” She begged, “Please, Clint, please!” 

He held her tighter. “I wish I could, Nat, I’m sorry, I wish I could.” It was true. He would do anything to help her. To make her feel safe. He glanced back to her door and saw Tony and Steve still standing there. He had hoped they would have left. Thankfully Natasha hadn’t seemed to notice them. Yet. 

“I’ve got you. Your safe, your safe.” He repeated. He could feel her whole body shaking. Sobs racking through her frail form. 

They stayed like for a little while. Clint holding her as she sobbed. Something she never does. He wished he could stay like this forever. Holding her. Keeping her safe. 

But then Clint heard footsteps behind him, coming into the room. He stiffened as Natasha’s head shot up. Steve had come into her bedroom. Natasha darted out of his grasp and ran into her bathroom, shutting and locking the door behind her. 

“Nat, wait!” He called after her, trying the doorknob even though he knew for a fact that it wouldn’t open. He whipped around to face Steve, and now Tony.

“I told you guys to go, now look. Just leave.” He spat angrily at them. Part of him knew that they cared about her and were just worried but he was just so angry that they had caused Natasha to run and hide from him. He was relieved when they left without saying anything. He decided he would apologize to them later. 

He went over to her door and knocked lightly on it. “Nat, it’s just me. They left. I’m sorry I told them not to come in.” He said softly. He put his ear to the door waiting for a response that never came. All he could hear were the muffled sobs of his best friend. He wanted to be in there with her. To hold her together when she couldn’t do it herself. He sunk down to the ground, pressing his back up against the door. 

“I’m right here, I’ll stay right here for as long as you need, Nat.” He said. And he meant it. He would always be there for her. No matter what.   
\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Natasha’s POV

No. This couldn’t be happening. They couldn’t have seen her like that. Now they were going to think she was weak. And she was. It was just a memory that had happened long ago and she had let herself be affected by it. 

She sat in the dark on the floor of her bathroom. Her arms wrapped around herself. No matter how hard she tried she couldn’t keep the tears from coming out. She was ashamed. She was nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> “Пожалуйста, это больно” = Please, it hurts.
> 
> Thanks for reading this! I know I left it on a bit of a cliff hanger but that just leaves something to look forward too!


	6. Chapter 5: Poisoned

She should have expected something like this. She should have warned the others not to open things that came to the compound without Clint or her looking at them first. It really should be common knowledge, especially for the Avengers. 

She, Clint and Steve were playing scrabble at the dining room table when Tony came over to them with a package left at the door. It didn’t have any address on it or anything, just a plain cardboard box. Before she could say anything he opened it up. It was thoughtless. 

There was a small bang and the room started to fill with a strange green smoke. They all jumped up from the table, abandoning their half finished game. 

“Tony!” Steve yelled, trying to catch him as he fell to the ground unconscious. Whatever it was, it was fast acting. 

She rushed back towards the table and picked up the box spreading this gas, her training kicking in. She ran towards the window above the sink and threw the box out, but she couldn’t do anything about the gas already spreading around the room. 

She looked around and saw that not only was Tony on the ground, but Clint as well. Steve looked close to passing out as well, his super soldier serum helping him stay conscious longer than the others. 

But why wasn’t she passed out on the floor? Except for a headache and finding it a bit hard to breathe, she felt alright. That's when it hit her. Whatever this gas was she had encountered it before. During her training in the Red Room. 

“Tash, I can’t-” Steve blurt out before he too passed out onto the floor. 

She looked around the room at the bodies of her friends passed out on the floor. It was all up to her. They needed her to help them. 

“Friday! Filter out this gas”! She yelled at the AI, hoping that she was capable of doing that. She didn’t know all the features Tony had built into this place. Thankfully the AI responded.

“Right away, Agent Romanoff, would you like me to analyze what it may be?” 

“Yes please” She said, thankful. As the gas started to clear from the room she felt her headache get worse, she almost started to feel lightheaded. Her lungs hurt from the effort it took to breathe. She needed to get her partners out of this room and to the medical wing. Unfortunately there wasn’t anyone else here that could help her, Bruce and Thor were still MIA. 

She went over to Clint, pressing her fingers to his neck, looking for a pulse. Thankfully there was one and it was strong, it was a good sign. She picked up his upper half and dragged him to the elevator. She went back to get the others. Before she was even halfway there she doubled over in pain. Her lungs felt like they were going to burst. Dots were starting to spread throughout her vision. But she couldn’t stop know, she had to get the others out. 

Ignoring the searing pain spreading through her chest she crawled over to Tony and dragged him into the elevator. Taking much longer then when she took Clint. All she wanted to do was lay on the ground and stay there. Wait for the pain to stop. But she couldn’t she had to save her friends. She still didn’t know what this gas was. It could kill them. 

“Friday! Do you know what it is?” she asked the AI, which caused her to double over in a coughing fit. 

“Seems to be a poisonous gas made by the KGB over 30 years ago, it doesn’t seem to have a name, but without the antidote in the next half hour, you will all suffer severe health complications.”

Shit. This was not what she needed. She needed to hurry and get Steve into the elevator with the others and get them to the medbay. She couldn’t waste another second. 

She ran over to Steve and dragged him into the elevator, wincing when she accidently banged his head into the wall. That would leave a bruise. Hopefully he wouldn’t be too mad since you know she was saving his life right now. 

She hit the floor that the medbay was on, falling to the floor once the doors slid shut and the elevator started to move. Just because the poison can’t kill her, doesn’t mean it doesn’t hurt like hell. 

After what felt like forever the elevator reached the right floor. It opened up right into the medbay so she didn’t have to drag them far. 

She didn’t bother to even try to haul them onto the beds, but just left them on the floor, putting pillows under their heads. 

The antidote was actually very simple and easy to get. It was just saline. This was chosen to be the antidote because it would be overlooked by scientists trying to save those poisoned by the gas. But it wouldn’t trick her. Because she was part of the class that made it. So whoever sent the gas knew it wouldn’t affect her. They knew she was one of the people to create it when she was a child. This was a message. 

She quickly hooked up the saline bags to each of her friends, relieved once she saw the color starting to return to their faces. But she didn’t bother to hook one up to herself. Instead she sat on the floor, her back against the wall. She pulled her knees up to herself, putting her head against her knees, trying to make it easier to breathe. 

She could give herself the saline, make the pain stop. But she didn’t deserve it. She deserved the pain. She had made the poison during her time in the Red Room. Designed the effects it would have on the human body. How fast it would spread. And now it had affected her friends. She had done this to them. She deserved to be in pain. She deserved it all. 

After about an hour she heard Steve start to stir. She lifted her head up of her knees. The pain had subsided a little, but it still hurt to breathe. She watched as Steve opened his eyes. Wincing at the bright lights above him. 

“How are you feeling?” She asked him, staying by the wall. She didn’t want to get close to him just in case he was mad at her. But he didn’t know she had made the gas so why would he be mad? She didn’t know why she was thinking this way. But she couldn’t help it. 

“Terrible” He replied closing his eyes again for a few seconds. She didn’t say anything. She didn’t know what to say. He opened his eyes again and turned his head towards her. 

“So what happened” He asked. Definitely a valid question to ask when you’ve just woken up laying on the ground with some sort of liquid being put into your body. 

“Tony opened that box, then we were all poisoned. You three passed out so I dragged you all up here and gave you the antidote so you won’t die.” She said. Displaying no emotion. She could see the confusion on his face as he took in that information.

“Why didn’t you pass out?” He asked. 

Damn. She had hoped he wouldn’t have asked that. Even though she knew that one of them would. She had yet to come up with a believable excuse, so all she could tell him was the truth. But not all of it of course. 

“Part of my training was building an immunity to different poisons. This was one of them. It just doesn’t affect me as much as it affects you and the others.” She said. There that was good enough. Right?

Steve looked confused for a moment. “But it still affects you right? So where's your medicine bag?” he asked. 

“Already had it.” she lied. Lying was second nature to her. But she always hated lying to her teammates. Even if it was in their better interest. 

“And we’ll all be okay?” Steve asked. 

“Yes, rest now, your body needs to heal.” She said. It was mostly true, but she actually just wanted him to go back to sleep and not ask her anymore questions. Thankfully he closed his eyes and seemed to go right back to sleep. 

She watched him sleep for a bit. He looked peaceful. She liked seeing him this way. Eventually she rested her head on her knees again. Her thoughts were a mixture of fear, self hatred and anger spiraling out of control.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Let me know your thoughts! Your comments really give me motivation to keep writing!


	7. Chapter 6: Betrayed

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this one is kinda short

“I’m trusting the two of you to succeed in this mission. Failure is not an option. Do you understand girls?” Madame B asked them. She had just finished giving Natalia and Karina the instructions for their mission. 

Natalia nodded her head to show Madame that she understood. She was not to fail. To fail was a weakness and they all knew that weakness meant death. She sensed that Karina was nodding her head as well. 

“Very good, I know you girls will make me proud. Off you go then.” Madame said, flashing them a smile. But it wasn’t a warm smile. It never was. Madame’s smiles were cold and threatening. Sinister, some would say. She and Karina took this as their que to leave. They turned around quietly and left her office. Thankful to finally get out of that space. 

She and Karina walked side by side down the hallway towards the stairs that led to their age group dormitory. They were all 14 now which meant they were trusted to stay in the basement and not make any trouble. When they reached the stairs they walked down them single file, keeping to the right side as to not make and creaks. Just like they were taught. 

Natalia felt Karina’s gaze on her. She turned to face her. Their eyes met. A forest green to an icy blue. Karina was very small and quiet just like her. The only difference was that Karina’s hair was a light blond. It almost liked white in the sunlight. Very different from her bright red hair. They maintained eye contact for a few more seconds. Not saying anything, they weren’t allowed to. 

Karina dropped her head and speed up to pass Natalia, going into the first room on the right of the stairs. Natalia stayed where she was for a moment. Watching. Waiting. For what she didn’t know. After a minute she followed Karina into their room, closing the door silently behind her. It was late and she didn’t want to risk waking the other occupants of the room. 

Their room was much like all the others. Except there were bigger beds, and alot less of them too. By this age more than half of her fellow pupils were dead. All she had watched die. Some she had killed herself. As she walked over to the closet holding her nightgown she felt the eyes of the girls still awake on her. They were watching Karina as well. Most definitely wondering why Madame had summoned them to her office. 

She tried to ignore the stares as she changed into her nightgown, brushed her teeth and climbed into bed. She pulled the thin cover over her before securing the handcuffs attached to her bed. They had to do this every night. It was the rules. When they were younger Madame would come and lock them herself. But they were expected to do it themselves now. If they didn’t, they would pay harshly. 

One night a few months ago, she decided not to put it on. She hated the feeling of the cold metal around her wrist. Madame found out when she had come to unlock the girls for breakfast. As a punishment, She was forced to be the subject of the 8 year old’s torture method class that day. After that she decided to always attach the handcuffs. She didn’t want a repeat lesson of what would happen if she disobeyed. 

She tried to get comfortable. But it was hard to ignore how cold she was. The thin blankets they were given really didn't give protection to the cold Russian winters. She closed her eyes and thought about the mission. It was simple really. Tomorrow Karina and her were to head up to Madame’s office, right after breakfast. She had dresses up there for them to change into. They were to head to Stalingrad and befriend the daughter of Alexi Drakov. 

According to Madame, Alexi Drakov was an ex KGB spy. Which made him an enemy of Russia. He had spread secrets to other organizations. And for that he had to pay. Which is exactly what she and Karina were going to do. 

They were to go to Alexi’s house and ask his daughter, Irene if she wanted to play. The 10 year old would most likely say yes. After they gained her trust, they were to lure her into a forest near his house. Madame said that others would be waiting there for them. That was all she said. She didn’t know what would happen to Irene after they betrayed her. But it probably wouldn’t be anything good. 

Natalia didn’t want to kill the little girl. She hadn’t done anything. She shouldn’t have to be hurt because of her father's mistakes. But she had to do it. Because if she didn’t she would be killed. She had learned long ago that she was nothing but a pawn. Used to get what others wanted. She had no free will. She was not allowed to make any choices for herself. She was nothing. She had no place in the world.


	8. Chapter 7: Kidnapped

(Natasha’s POV)

It all happened so fast. The last thing she remembered was falling asleep in her bed, her face buried underneath a pillow. She was exhausted from training so the likelihood for a good night's sleep was strong. But instead of being woken up by the sunlight streaming through her window or the sounds of others wandering around the compound, she was woken up by a cloth being put over her mouth and nose. 

As soon as she awoke, horror and fear surged through her. Her instinct urged her to flee. As she tried to jump out of bed and lung at the person attacking her she realized she couldn’t. There were strong hands holding her down. There was no escape. The cloth was still being held to her face, the unique smell of chloroform overpowering her. Her vision started to go foggy and her head felt like it was full of cotton. Almost like she had too much to drink. The fumes burned her eyes, and the world starting to go dark. But before it did she was able to get a look at the people in her bedroom. 

There were 3 of them. 2 holding her down and the other pressing the cloth to her face. She stared up at the face closest to her own. It was a girl. They all were, no older than 17. The girl's eyes were cold and empty. Her face void of all emotion. It was an expression she recognized as it reflected her own at that age. They were students of the Red Room. As she succumbed to the darkness she felt a different type of fear she hadn’t felt in a long time. 

She dreamed of a little girl with no face. Dancing to the same song over and over again. Mimicking the moves of other faceless girls around her. Pointe shoes drenched in blood, spreading pictures all along the floor. 

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(Steve’s POV)

He had always liked the sunrise. But it was so much different now than it was 70 years ago. He remembered how he and his mum used to wake up early every morning before school just to watch it from their back porch. Sometimes Bucky would join them, not often though he definitely wasn’t an early riser. He missed those times, sometimes he wished he could go back. Things were simpler then. 

Now he was sitting on one of the chairs in the kitchen. A warm cup of coffee in his hand. He had never really liked coffee, but it didn’t taste half bad when diluted with sugar and creamer. Another cup was sitting on the table next to him. Untouched. Usually, Natasha would sit and watch the sunrise with him. It kinda turned into their little routine. He would make coffee, and the smell would lure Natasha out to the kitchen. She drank hers black, something he thought was absolutely disgusting. They had done this every morning for weeks so it was a bit weird she wasn’t here now. But he knew she had spent most of yesterday down in the training room, so she must be tired. So he drank his coffee much slower than usual and ended up watching the sunrise by himself. 

He stayed by the table a little while longer. He had started to treasure their little mornings together. He had gotten a lot closer to her these last few months, ever since Ultron he and Natasha had kinda been running an Avengers training base. They both trained Sam, Wanda, and Vision in combat making them stronger for when things go wrong. Which they always did sooner or later. 

He heard footsteps coming towards the kitchen. He was almost sure it was Natasha, but as Sam came through the doorway his hopes were crushed. And Sam could tell. 

“What you're not happy to see me?” Sam chuckled. He had obviously picked up on the amount of time he and Natasha had started to spend together. 

“Just not the person I’m waiting for” He replied. He stood up and grabbed the coffee cups off the table. One empty and one full. He dumped the now cold black coffee down the drain and placed the empty cups in the dishwasher. 

“What did you do to piss her off?” Sam asked teasingly, sitting down where Steve had just gotten up from. A bowl of cereal next to him. Chocolate cheerios, the only person in the compound who liked them. 

“Nothing that I can think of” he responded, laughing along with Sam, “She was working hard yesterday, I’m sure she’s just sleeping in.” 

He and Sam carried on chatting for a while. Talking about things like what shows they were watching or how they should go to that new bar that just opened up. It was nice not to talk about missions and being superheroes for once. Not that he didn’t enjoy being a part of the Avengers, he just sometimes missed being Steve Rogers the guy from New York instead of Captain America. 

It was only 8 am when he and Sam’s conversation was interrupted by Wanda and Vision joining them in the kitchen. Just like him and Natasha, Wanda and Vision had started to become close as well. It was quite a surprise to see Wanda up at this hour, let alone wearing everyday clothes looking like she was ready to go out somewhere. Unless it was required for training, Wanda didn’t usually emerge from her room anytime before 10 am. 

“Where are you off too?” Sam asked. A question he would’ve asked himself it Sam hadn’t beat him to it. 

“Nat and I are going to go visit Pepper, where is she? We need to get going or we’re going to be late.” She replied while filling up a water bottle with the filtered water from the fridge. 

This statement worried him a little. It was very unlike Natasha to be late for something she had planned. If she had planned on going somewhere, she went and was never late. 

“I’ll go see if she’s awake” He decided, turning to leave the kitchen. 

“Of course you will.” Sam teased again. 

He flashed him a smile before he left, but it wasn’t genuine. He couldn’t shake the feeling that something was wrong. He walked to Natasha’s room quickly. He needed to know that she was alright. He was probably making a mountain out of a molehill. She probably just slept through her alarm. It happens, he has done it on more than one occasion. 

He went down the stairs 2 at a time, getting to her door in seconds. He paused outside of her door for a moment. This was ridiculous, nothing was wrong. He would just knock on the door, waking her up and then she’d be mad at him for waking her. But he just had to know for sure that she was alright. 

He knocked on the door softly. He waited for a few seconds, but when he heard no sounds coming from the room he knocked again. Louder this time. He felt a wave of dread consume him as again no sounds came from her bedroom. Something was wrong. 

Without thinking about it he swung her door open. What he saw left him speechless. Natasha’s once tidy bedroom was a mess. Her bed covers were thrown to the ground, her books and papers scattered the ground. All of her drawers were open, the contents on the ground. But most concerning was the words written on the white wall above her bed. Two words written in blood. Natasha’s blood. 

He unfroze and called out for Sam. Without taking his eyes off of her empty bed he heard Sam and the others come running down the stairs. Wanda gasped as soon as she saw Natasha’s room, tears welling in her eyes. It took him a lot of willpower not to let any tears run down his face. Not now. 

“Same call Tony and Clint right now,” He said. His voice sounded strained. He was not as good at hiding his emotions as Natasha was. He couldn’t hide the horror on his face as he read the words on her wall over and over again.

Красная комната. Red Room.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so excited to write more about this!


	9. Chapter 8: Fever

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm sorry this one isn't that good I had a hard time thinking of an idea.

(Steve’s POV)

He, Clint and Natasha were sitting on the huge couch in Avengers Tower. It was dark out and all the lights were off, the only source of light was from the tv playing Bambi. It was his turn to pick the movie and Bambi had been made in 1945, so it reminded him of when he and Bucky had gone and seen movies when they were boys. 

They were about halfway through and he and Clint seemed to be enjoying it, but it looked like Natasha was falling asleep. He thought she liked Disney movies. He remembered that Natasha hadn’t been acting like her usual self today. She seemed extremely tired and didn’t eat much for lunch or dinner. 

He looked at her a little more carefully. She had a thick blanket wrapped around herself which was odd since it was the middle of July. But the more concerning thing was that despite the blanket she was shivering. And it wasn’t like it was cold in the tower, he and Clint were doing perfectly fine in shorts and t-shirts. 

Natasha must of sensed him staring at her because she turned her head to face him. 

“What you staring at Rogers?” She said defensively. 

He took this as another sign that something was wrong as she usually wasn’t so quick to snap at him. Not unless something was wrong. 

“It’s just that it’s the middle of July and your shivering and wrapped up a blanket.” He responded. He internally cringed at himself as he sounded like an overbearing grandmother. And he could tell by the unimpressed look in Natasha’s face that she didn’t appreciate it. It only made her more angry when Clint decided to chime in. 

“And I beat you every round we did in the training room, much easier than usual.” Clint teased. Not a good choice in his opinion. 

“You wish you could beat me Barton, I’m just cold so stop staring at me and watch your stupid movie.” She spat angrily. With that she got up off the couch where she was sitting in between him and Clint and went over to the opposite side of the room and laid down on the couch over there, her back to them. 

He exchanged a look of concern with Clint before deciding to drop the subject and continue to watch the movie. But he couldn’t focus on it anymore, his head too clouded with thoughts of worry over Natasha’s strange behaviour. He could tell Clint felt the same. But they decided to just let her be till the movie was over, she seemed pretty pissed off right now anyway. 

About an hour later, the movie was over. And Natasha hadn’t moved from her spot. Her back still to them. He couldn’t even tell if she was awake or not. He hadn’t even noticed Clint staring at him, but the archer seemed to have read his mind. 

“She’s asleep. I can tell by the way she’s breathing.” Clint stated matter of factly. He couldn’t help but hide the confusion on his face as he wondered how Clint would know that. Clint noticed and quickly added, “I know from missions and stuff like that when one of us would sleep and the other would keep watch.”

“Do you know what’s up with her?” He asked, assuming Clint would know since they were so close. Something he was a bit jealous of, but he wouldn’t admit that to anyone. He could barely admit it to himself. 

“I think she might be getting sick or already sick, that would explain why she was wrapped up in a blanket. She doesn’t like telling people she’s sick because she hates it when we try to help her.” Clint responded. 

This made sense to him. It would also explain why she hadn’t eaten much that day. He realized he had forgotten about getting sick. Ever since the serum, he hadn’t even had so much as the common cold. It reminded him of when he was younger. When he was plagued with diseases and was sick for weeks at a time. The thing he hated most about being sick was the way it affected his mother. 

She would have to stay home from work so often to take care of him that she was eventually fired from her job at the bakery. With only his father working and without the extra funds from the bakery they had to move into a smaller apartment in the poorer side of Brooklyn. Farther away from Bucky. He had always felt guilty about that because he knew it was his fault no matter how many times his mother insisted that it wasn’t. He vowed from a young age to make it up to her. Even now it upset him that she had died before she could see who he turned out to be. Would she be proud? Or would she be disappointed? He could never say for sure. 

Just then he noticed Clint get up from the couch and walk over to Natasha. Clint hesitated for a moment, worried that he might wake her, before lightly resting the back of his hand against her forehead. 

“Jesus Christ” Clint gasped. This was enough to alert Natasha to his presence. And even though she was sick she was able to strike like a snake and grab Clint’s wrist, pulling it roughly off her forehead. 

“Get off me!” she spat, but she didn’t get up from where she was laying. 

“Your burning up!” Clint shot back, with just as much anger as Natasha had given him. Upset over the fact that she didn’t tell him just how sick she was. He was at his feet at this point. Watching the two spies argue from afar. 

“It’s none of your business! Just because I’m sick doesn’t mean I have to act like a child like you!” Natasha argued. She managed to sit up on the couch. But he could tell it took a lot of effort and she was leaning heavily against the back of the couch. 

He tried his best to hide the smile that emerged on his face after her last statement. Mostly because they were scabbling like children. Arguing wasn’t doing her any good. He decided then that he would try to take care of her, just like his mother had once taken care of him. Whether she wanted it or not. 

“Clint” He said, trying to give Clint a look to signal that he would take care of it. He didn’t think he did it very well but thankfully Clint got the message. 

Throwing his hands up in the air he turned to walk out of the living room towards the direction of his room. “Good luck Cap.” Clint shouted back. And with that he was gone. 

“I don’t need to be taken care of” Natasha growled at him, shooting him a glare. 

“I know” He simply replied, walking over to where she sat and dealing down in front of her. He reached up to rest his hand on her forehead but she stopped him. “Just let me do this, please, I want to help you.” He repeated the words his mother had used on him when he had tried to convince her he wasn’t sick. He felt an ache in his chest when he said them, missing her more than he had in a long time. 

Natasha looked at him for a few seconds before letting go of his wrist. Her small way of giving in. She must really be sick. He put his hand gently on her forehead. Clint was right, she was burning up. Her eyes were red with fever and the fight that was in her face changed into a look of exhaustion. Even if she didn’t want his help he knew she needed it. This was much more than a small bug. 

He put his arms underneath her and picked her up, blanket and all. She melted into his touch, resting her head against his chest. As he walked towards her room he looked down at her face. Her eyes were closed, her cheeks red with heat. He noticed that even though she was sick she looked at peace. It was the first time he had seen that look on her face. She felt safe with him. 

When he got to her room instead of putting her in her bed like he had planned, he decided to sit in the soft chair next to it. Holding her close to him, resting his cheek against her forehead. She opened her eyes for a moment but quickly closed them again. They were silent for a long time. He had almost thought that she was asleep, but her soft voice filled the room. 

“You tell no one about this.” she said, a small smile spreading across her face. This night was just for them and no one else.


	10. Chapter 9: Stranded

“Any luck?” She asked Clint, as they both tried to get ahold of SHIELD. They had both been sent on a mission to take out a small Hydra base. Simple stuff really. But they were now having problems getting ahold of SHIELD for their pickup. The island they were on seemed to have some kind of barrier stopping outgoing and incoming calls. 

“Not even a voicemail” Clint replied sounding frustrated. She felt just the same way. Without SHIELD they had no way off this island. She put her phone back into the pocket of her catsuit, feeling exhausted. Taking down the Hydra base had been easy but she still had a few cuts and bruises to remind her of it. 

They were standing on the edge of a beach, overlooking the pacific ocean. They were lucky it wasn’t cold, otherwise they would be in much more trouble than they are now. The sun had just started to set. She looked up at the sky taking in the pink, orange and red swirling in the sky. The light reflecting off the waves, making them sparkle. 

Without taking her eyes off the sky she sat down on the sand. She was tired, not just physically but mentally as well. She was tired of pretending to not be afraid when she was. She was tired of keeping her walls up, always having to look behind her back making sure no one from her past was hunting her. And they always were. She was tired of pretending to be strong when all she wanted to do was fall apart. She couldn’t do this anymore. 

“Hey are you hurt?” Clint asked as soon as she sat down. 

“No.” She replied softly, not taking her eyes off the waves crashing onto the beach in front of her. She knew she should stand up and pretend she was alright but she just couldn’t. Here she was on an abandoned island with her partner, her best friend. The man who knew the most about her past, the man who loved her no matter what she had done. 

“I’ve spend so long putting up so many walls that I don’t know how to take them down anymore.”

Her own voice startled her. She didn’t mean to say that outloud but as the words tumbled from her lips she didn’t regret them. Clint was silent for a moment, taking in what she had just said. After a few seconds he sat down on the sand next to her. After he didn’t say anything she continued.

“I put on thousands of faces that I don’t even know which one is mine. Stark once asked if there was anything real about me. And I don’t know if there is.” She winced as her voice cracked on the last word. She was being weak and she knew it, but she couldn’t stop the words from coming out of her mouth. 

“This is real.” Clint said. She sensed him turn his head and look at her, but she couldn’t meet his eyes. But he was right, these were her real feelings. She felt tears start to form in her eyes. But she was determined not to cry, she hadn’t cried in front of anyone in years, not even Clint. 

“This isn’t even my real name.” She admitted. Even though she knew Clint already knew that it felt as though she had been keeping it a secret. “Natasha Romanoff is just another cover, just like Natalie Rushman and all the others.” 

Clint was silent. She could tell he had no idea what to say. Because it was true. She wasn’t Natasha Romanoff the Avenger. The hero. She was Natalia Romanova, the KGB spy. The killer, the monster. 

“You are not a monster.” Clint said firmly. “It isn’t your fault what happened to you, you didn’t have a choice. They made you do things that you didn’t want to do and then punished you for it.” 

“I deserved everything they did to me. I deserved to be tortured.” She told him. And she meant it. She really did believe that she deserved it all. She had done terrible terrible things to innocent people. To innocent children. She felt a tear slide down her cheek. 

“No you didn’t!” Clint said, a little too loudly. He reached out to pull her into a hug but she involuntarily flinched away. She didn’t mean to but thinking about her past made her feel afraid. She knew Clint would never hurt her, but she was still afraid. She stood up and wrapped her arms around herself, backing slowly away from Clint. Her breathing was getting faster and faster. She felt like she needed to run as far away as possible but she was frozen. Her eyes locked on Clint. 

Her thoughts were spiraling out of control. Splashes of all the horrible things she had done flashed through her mind. The faces of the people she killed, the sounds of their screams. She couldn’t make it stop. The world was spinning and she needed to make the screaming stop. She couldn’t take it anymore, she didn’t want to remember how she had burnt down that hospital, or how many children she had killed in the red room. Her peers, her friends. 

She fell to her knees, hands covering her ears and sobbed. She couldn’t make herself stop. Clint ran over to her and without hesitation wrapped his arms around her. She sobbed into his shoulder, her tears soaking into his shirt. Everything hurt and she just wanted the pain to stop. 

Clint held her tightly against himself, almost trying to hold her together. But the tears wouldn’t stop. Her chest felt tight and she took huge breathes in between sobs to get air. She couldn’t stop thinking about all the terrible things she had done. 

“I got you, your safe.” Clint said softly, “your safe, I promise.” He brushed his hand through her hair, detangling some parts. He repeated those words over and over again. And after awhile her sobs simply turned into quiet whimpers. They stayed like that for awhile, the sun had set casting darkness over the beach. She felt water lapping at them as the tide started to come in. 

She didn’t want Clint to let go. Because she knew that right here right now she was safe, he wouldn’t let anything happen to her. She hadn’t felt safe in a long time. 

“When we get back, we take a few months off and go back to the farm and see Laura. It’s safe there, you don’t have to worry about people coming to hurt you. I won’t let that happen, Laura and I will take care of you and when your ready we can go back to work.” Clint told her. 

It sounded amazing. When she first came to America, she was a broken young woman who didn’t know how to function in the outside world. She, Laura and Clint stayed at the farm for a long time. They acted like parents to her. Didn’t make her feel weak for crying. She wanted that again. She needed that again. 

A few hours later they spotted the Quinjet in the sky, coming towards them. She glanced at it for a moment but then buried her face back into Clint’s chest. She didn’t want to leave, she wanted to stay in Clint’s embrace forever. She didn’t want to have to put her guards back up and pretend she was alright. She just didn’t have the energy anymore. 

She closed her eyes, tears still falling down her face. She just wanted to pretend that she wasn’t there. Clint could sense that she was in no condition to take care of herself right now. So he would do it for her. She was relieved. 

As the Quinjet landed further down the beach Clint got up, picking her up and holding her to his chest. She still didn’t open her eyes. She started to shiver since they were wet from the water and it had gotten colder out now that the sun had gone down. She felt weak. She was weak.


	11. Chapter 10: Bruises

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Added a little hint at Winterwidow in there for ya lol

“James it’s okay! It was an accident! You didn’t mean to hurt me!” She called after him as he pretty much ran from the sparring gym. She had seen the tears in his eyes. They had been sparring for a few hours, just blowing off some steam when he had suffered a flashback. It had only lasted a few minutes, but that was apparently just enough time for his metal hand to wrap tightly around her neck. 

The moment he realized what he had done he ran out of the gym without saying a word, leaving her gasping for breath on the mats. She tried to call out to him to let him know that she was okay but it sounded like a strained whisper. 

Sitting on the mats she grabbed her throat and coughed violently. Her throat felt like it was on fire, like it was collapsing in on itself not letting any air through. Right before he let her go her vision had gone dark and she almost passed out, but was able to pull herself out of it. A talent she had mastered in her time in the Red Room. 

Now that she was alone she let her guard down. Feeling his hand around her throat unburied memories from the past that she had worked so hard on keeping down. She knew that James did not remember the time they had spent together in the Red Room, but she did. Every minute of it. No matter how hard she tried to forget she never could. 

She remembered how cold and hostile he was after every memory wipe, joining in with the other instructors in beating them for fun. But the longer he stayed out of the ice the more he remembers. He started to remember how to feel and how to love, things he then tried to teach her. Their relationship was the thing that kept her whole, she often wonders if he was the reason she survived the abuse of the Red Room. He protected her the best he could without being caught by the other instructors, he held her when she was afraid or woke up with nightmares about things she had been forced to do. And for just a little while everything would feel like it would be alright. But it didn’t last, nothing like that ever did. 

After a few weeks he would start remembering things about his past, he would remember the training he went through, how he lost his arm, and his name. He struggled with these memories but was still able to hide what he remembered when his handlers came to check on him. That is until he remembered him. Back then she didn’t know who he was talking about when he remembered a man named Steve from his past. But now she knew he was talking about the Steve she now knows, Captain America. As soon as he remembered Steve, he would fall apart, his handlers would noticed and he would be wiped again. Then the cycle would start all over again. It was exhausting, but it was worth it for her. She missed his arms around her, she wished he would remember her. But it was a huge possibility he never would. 

It hurt to think about, she didn’t want to entertain the idea of him remembering her anymore so she stuffed these thoughts and memories back where they belonged. In a room in the back of her mind where only she can access them if she ever wanted too. She stood up from where she had been sitting on the mats and walked over to one of the big mirrors, so that she was standing right infront of it. She lifted her chin so that she could better see her neck, causing a spike of pain. It had only been about 15 minutes since it happened but she could already see the purple and black bruises starting to form. It looked terrible, she had no idea how she was going to hide it. She was talented at hiding injuries with makeup but there wasn’t enough makeup in the world to hide these bruises effectively. She couldn’t wear turtlenecks, mostly because she didn’t own any but she had never worn that kind of clothing around the others so they would be suspicious. 

She froze when she heard the gym door swing open. At first she thought it was James coming back but the tell tale footsteps of the archer quickly told her otherwise. She didn’t turn to look at him but instead tried to make herself look strong and unfazed by what had just occurred. But the purple and black bruises blossoming on her neck had a bad effect on her act. As Clint came towards her she turned away from the mirror to face him. Somehow hoping he wouldn’t take notice to the bruises, which was a ridiculous wish. 

“You know when I saw Bucky run out of here and you not follow I kinda thought I would find you dead on the floor.” He said with a chuckle. 

She couldn’t help but smile at that, he always made her feel better. He lifted a hand to her chin and lifted it up so he could see her neck better. 

“That’s gonna be hard to explain to the others though.” He said more seriously. He dropped his hand from her chin and grabbed her hand instead. He was looking at her curiously, like he was looking for something behind the mask she had on her face. She tried not to look uncomfortable under his watchful eye but it was hard. 

“Are you okay?” He asked her, giving up on trying to see what she was thinking on her face. He couldn’t tell how she felt. Sometimes he could when she was especially rattled, but not this time. 

“I’ll survive” She replied flashing him a small smile. She knew he was asking her if she was okay mentally but decided to reply as if she asked if she was physically okay. She didn’t feel like letting him into the vault that was her mind today. 

“Does it hurt?” Clint asked, probably knowing that they was no way she would truthfully answer him. 

“No” she rasped, wincing at the sound of her damaged voice. “Is Bucky okay?” she asked, trying to change the subject away from her. 

“I don’t know, he, Steve and Sam were sitting in the living room when I came down here, he looked pretty shaken up.” Clint responded.

She let go of his hand. She was glad that James had Steve and Sam to help comfort him. She couldn’t help but feel a bit jealous of Steve. How come James remembered him but not her? She needed to be alone to think. She quickly walked towards the gym door.

“I’m going to turn in early for the night” she called over her shoulder to Clint. She felt kinda bad ditching him when he had just come to check on her, but she needed to be alone. So without thinking about it anymore she shut the door behind her and climbed the stairs to her bedroom and went in locking the door behind her. She immediately went and sat on her floor, leaning her back against her bed. She hadn’t even bothered to turn on the light.


	12. Chapter 11: Hypothermia

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was feeling kinda sad and just wrote this in one sitting. I know its short but one-shots are supposed to be right? I really want to write a longer story about this. Let me know your thoughts it really helps.

She didn’t know why she was doing what she was doing. She had just finished a mission for SHIELD, it had been simple. Break into the target’s house, collect the stolen information, kill him and leave staging the scene as a suicide. Child’s play. Except that the location of the target’s house was only 20 miles away from the burnt remains of the place she had been raised, the Red Room. 

She should’ve headed back to the extraction point to be flown back to America, but for some reason, she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t leave just yet. She hadn’t been back to the remains of the Red Room Academy since she burnt it to the ground 5 years ago, just after she defected to the States. No one had been in it though, she was too late. Right after she escaped the Red Room operation went underground, and she still couldn’t find where they were hiding. Clint and the others had tried to convince her that maybe they weren’t doing that to children anymore. But she knew they were. Why would they stop something that had been so successful?

So instead of walking the 5 minutes to the warm cabin that was her extraction point, she went out the door into the harsh Russian winter wearing nothing but her catsuit and a light jacket she had on earlier. A stupid decision that would come back to bite her in the ass. But she hadn’t been thinking clearly when she had left the target’s house. 

Now she had been walking for about an hour and a half, the cold had finally started to affect her. She was shivering violently no matter how hard she tried not to. She could barely feel her feet as they stepped through the thick snow that was up to her knees. They felt like blocks of ice weighing her down. But she just kept walking, she couldn’t make herself stop. Something was drawing her to the academy, what she didn’t know. She just needed to get there. 

Walking through the snowy forest reminded her a lot of one of the tests given to them by the academy every winter since she was 6 years old. They would randomly wake them up one winter’s night and cart them outside and pile them into a van. Wearing nothing but the nightgowns they wore to bed, some girls didn’t even have time to get their shoes on. They would be driven a while away from the academy and then thrown out into the harsh winter. They were to make it back to the academy on their own. The girls who couldn’t make it back were considered weak. The places they had succumbed to the cold acted as their final resting places. Alone in the Russian wilderness. She had learned at a young age to always go to sleep in the winter with her shoes on. 

The sun had started to set. The sunbeams poking their way through the fir trees and reflecting off the snow. She wrapped her arms around herself and tried to soak up the little warmth the sun provided, as it would soon disappear. She knew she was walking slower than she had when she first started the trek. She chose to ignore the realization that she was entering the first stages of hypothermia. But if she could survive the cold as a little 10-year-old in a nightgown, then she could do it now. 

The next hour of walking was spent thinking about memories from the Red Room, something she wasn’t necessarily choosing to think about. She felt as numb as her feet and hands. The memories she was reliving didn’t feel like they belonged to her but to someone else. Like her younger self was just a fictional character in a story she was telling. Suddenly she realized she had started to cry. She only noticed the tears sliding down her face because of how badly the hot tears burned her frozen skin. It felt like someone was slicing her cheeks with a knife. 

She couldn’t remember the last time she had cried in front of anyone. She had been close, but she had always been able to keep the tears at bay. Crying meant weakness. And she couldn’t let anyone know that she was weak. Even though she was alone she still felt ashamed of the tears that spilled onto her pale skin. She wished she didn’t. She wished she could just cry and not feel like such a failure. She wanted someone to hold her tightly and let her sob into their shoulders. But that would never happen. So she wrapped her arms tighter around herself and continued walking towards the place that had created her. Tears freezing to her face. 

She had been walking for about 3 and a half hours now. She was so numb she didn’t even feel cold anymore. She hadn’t even noticed she had stopped shivering until now. Each step she took was painful. Finally, her body could take no more and she fell to her knees. She tried to grab onto a tree trunk to help pull herself back up but her muscles were so frozen she couldn’t do it. She looked down at the base of the tree trunk. That's when she saw it. The dirty brown piece of fabric poking up out of the snow. She used the last of her energy to dig it out and bring it to the surface to see what it was. 

Horror and sorrow surged through her as she realized what the fabric was. In her frozen hands, she was holding a little girl's nightgown. Dirty from the years spent under this fir tree. More scalding tears poured down her face but she made no noise. She just felt so tired. As she lay under the tree looking up at the sky, more snow started to fall. Flake after flake landed on her frozen skin, melting as soon as they did. Finally, Natasha Romanoff did something she never did. She gave up. 

Clutching the little girl's nightgown to her chest she let her eyes fall shut. She would die here where a little girl had frozen years earlier, at least now the child wouldn’t be alone. As the world slid away from her the last thing she heard was a familiar voice calling out her name in the distance.


	13. Chapter 12: Electrocution

She had decided that she liked ballet. They had started having classes when she and the other girls were four years old. Back then she had enjoyed the music and wearing pretty dresses and shoes. But now, three years later she had learned to never make a mistake. Not when Madame B was there. She still enjoyed dancing to the music but she now hated the dresses. It was always so cold in the room they danced. She hated the shoes that made her feet bleed. But she still preferred ballet classes over any others. 

Now she sat on the floor of the dance room along with twenty-five other little girls getting ready for class. Some of them were tying up their shoes, putting on their leotards and tights or doing their hair. She was doing the latter. She used her fingers to comb through the tangles in her bright red hair, she had gotten very good at that since they were rarely ever given brushes during ballet. She quickly braided the long hair and wrapped it up into a tight bun on the top of her head. 

When she finished she stood and faced the mirror. She looked at herself standing there in the white tights and black leotard, hair pulled back. She looked small and pale, like a sick child instead of the deadly assassin she knew she was. She could even see the goosebumps that had appeared on her bony arms. She watched in the mirror as another one of the girls walked over to her, hair elastic in hand. 

Anya had long blonde hair and green eyes. She was a bit taller than her but not by much. She didn’t know exactly what to call Anya, she wasn’t her friend, they weren’t allowed friends. She was her competitor. She turned to face her as she approached.

“Will you help me with my hair, Natalia?” Anya asked her. Without even waiting for an answer she got down onto her knees in front of her so that she could reach Anya’s head. Without saying anything she grabbed the elastic from Anya’s hand and started to braid it just like she had done with her own. She often helped the other girls with their hair since she was the best at braiding. She didn’t know why she had learned how to do it so quickly. It just came to her easily. Just like everything else, except ballet. 

She had almost finished securing the braid into a bun on the top of Anya’s head when she heard the door to the room fling open. She barely even had time to put the elastic in place before the sound of Madame B’s heels slammed along the floor towards her and Anya at an incredible speed. She and Anya froze in fear, not moving from the positions they were in. She could feel the dread surging through her body and knew that Anya felt the same. 

“Natalia! How many times have I told you that you will not help the others with their hair? They must learn how to do it themselves!” Madame B screamed as she shoved Natalia to the floor. 

She looked up at the woman towering over her and did her best to hide the fear she felt. 

“I’m sorry Madame, it will not happen again.” She replied at almost a whisper. 

Madame answered her by kicking her in the stomach. She struggled to hide the pain and knew that it showed on her face. Before Madame B could kick her again she scrambled up from the floor and joined the other girls who had gotten into their lines as soon as Madame B came into the room. Madame B glared at her, but thankfully decided to start the class instead of beat her for her misbehaviour. 

She stood in first position in the middle of the back row. She knew that the back row was for the girls that were the worst at ballet. She felt ashamed to be there. She should be in the front with Anya and the other girls who showed talent in the dance. She was good at everything from learning language to killing. It made no sense that she could not grasp the art of ballet. Maybe she wasn’t trying hard enough. How could she show Madame B that she was trying? How could she make her proud?

The music started and she immediately started dancing to it. The practice steps they had learned 2 weeks before. It took her a few days to finally remember it. Something that not only frustrated her, but Madame B as well. And nothing good ever happened when Madame was upset. But now the practice routine was ingrained in her muscle memory, each motion being executed perfectly. The same couldn’t be said for some of the other girls joining her in the back row. 

Every time someone fell behind, missed a step or was sloppy the music stopped and started again from the beginning. Over and over again, until every step the girls did were flawless. The routine was 20 minutes long, sometimes they danced for hours until their pale pink shoes turned red. 

They had almost neared the end of the song when the black haired girl next to her fell out of her adagio. 

“Stop.” Madame said sternly from where she was sitting and watching them. She immediately stepped out of her own adagio and returned back to first position ready to start the routine again. The music stopped with a screech and was rewound back to the beginning. 

“Again.” The same stern voice called out. The first familiar notes met her ears, so she and the other girls around her started the dance again. And again. And again. And again.

She was exhausted. They had been doing the same dance for hours now. She did her best to stay strong and not let her exhaustion show but it was difficult. Everytime a girl stumbled she resented them more and more. She knew she was getting better and hadn’t yet messed up once. A first for her. And even though she was tired and in pain she was proud of herself. But Madame B always said that overconfidence lead to failure. And she was right. 

During the same adagio that the other girl beside her fell out of the first run-thru, she felt her foot slid out from underneath her and before she knew it she was face down on the floor. An overwhelming sense of fear and shame flowed through her turning her once pale face a bright red. She was so angry with herself. She was perfect she couldn’t fail. Failure meant weakness and weakness meant death. She started to cry. One of the worst crimes in the Red Room Academy. 

“Natalia, stop those tears right now! You are better than this!” She heard Madame screech but she didn’t turn to face her. Another mistake she would soon pay for. She heard the tell tale sound of Madame’s heels clicking on the hardwood floor. She could feel the floor vibrate with each step against her cheek that pressed against the hardwood. 

Madame B grabbed her by the back of the neck and yanked her up onto her bloodied feet. She now faced all the girls that had formed a circle around her and Madame B. The tears were still running down her face. She was ashamed. 

“Let Natalia be an example to you girls” Madame B said as she pulled the cattle prod out of her coat where it had been hiding. “You are seven years old. Old enough to know that crying is not tolerated here.” And which that Madame B connected to the top of the cattle prod to Natalia’s stomach. 

Her muscles seized up and all she could feel was the burning electricity that had filled her body. It felt as though she was being filled with boiling hot water. She couldn’t scream she couldn’t breath. All she felt was the familiar pain of the cattle prod. Finally, after what felt like hours Madame moved the cattle prod away, taking the pain that came with it. Madame let go of her and she had no other choice but to fall to the floor once again, her legs would not support her. She roze her head up from the floor and locked eyes with Anya. She could see the fear she felt reflected in Anya’s face. She wondered what hers looked like. 

“Go back to your dorm Natalia, you will not have dinner tonight and I do not want to see your face until morning.” Madame B ordered. 

She tried to obey but her muscles still felt stiff and out of her control. It hurt to move she just wanted to stay on the floor. After much effort she managed to climb up to her knees but apparently this wasn’t quick enough. A swift kick from Madame’s heels sent her falling on her face for the third time that day. 

“I said I don’t want to see you till the morning, Natalia!” Madame B screamed at her, raising the cattle prod above her head threateningly. Even though her sore muscles protested she managed to get to her feet and clumsily run out of the dance room and down the hall towards the seven year dorm room. She couldn’t ignore the stares she received from other students. She couldn’t have reached her dorm soon enough. 

As soon as the door closed behind her she fell to the floor in the middle of the room and sobbed. She was alone and there was no one to see her weakness so she let the tears flow. She was angry with herself. She needed to be perfect. She could not fail. She did not want to die. She wanted to see the world outside of the school grounds. But what if she never did. She knew that she could die tomorrow if she wasn’t perfect. 

Determination quickly replaced the shame she felt as she gathered herself off the floor and on to her feet. She would not be forgotten. She would not be beat. She would be perfect. So standing alone in the dorm she began to dance the routine once again. She would not stop until it was perfect. She didn’t even care that the blisters that had just stopped bleeding, started to ooze crimson once again.


	14. Chapter 13: "Stay"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Stay" isn't said in dialogue but I still used the idea. I'm trying to update as quickly as possible but I don't want these chapters to seem rushed or anything.

She lay on the ground in a pool of her own blood. It soaked into the motel carpet turning it a dark brown. Just another stain added to the dirty room. She stared up at the ceiling and placed her pale hand on the wound in her right side. She felt the warm liquid oozing out where the bullet had hit her. A lucky shot from her mark right before she snapped his neck. A lucky shot or did she let the bullet hit her. She knew she could’ve gotten that gun away from him. 

After she had killed him she was somehow able to drag herself back to the motel where she was staying. She didn’t even have the energy to get on the bed so she let herself collapse on the floor. Her vision was getting foggy and she knew that she needed to patch up the wound before she bled out. 

She would heal and then be sent on another mission for the KGB. A cycle that would only end when she died. There was no escape. She had no life, she wasn’t a person. She was a machine designed just for them. And she didn’t want to do their bidding anymore. 

So that was where she was now, lying on the ground staring up at the ceiling of a danky Stalingrad hotel waiting to die. She had been laying there for some time now and the wound wasn’t bleeding as heavily anymore. Maybe this wound wasn’t enough to kill her. She felt tears form in her eyes. She didn’t even try to stop them from spilling out over her face. There was no one here to see her. 

She wished that she could remember even a little bit of her parents. Her mother's voice. The colour of her father's eyes. Even their names. She wanted to think about something nice as she died. But she had almost no memories like that. 

Her tears turned into sobs, and as they racked her frail body she wished for the world to go dark and for it all to end. She was trained not to want things. But she wanted death more than anything. Death was freedom. The only escape from the fucked up world she was forced to be apart of. Or so she thought. 

She heard the window she had her back to open. Any other time she would already be on her feet and firing a shot in the intruders chest. But now she didn’t care. She quickly stopped the sobs and fell silent, but didn’t move from the position she was in. All she did was close her eyes and wait for the intruder to kill her. 

After a few moments when death didn’t come she opened her eyes. Right in front of her was a man, pointing an arrow right at her face. She recognized him as the agent who had been stalking her for the last few weeks. Dirty blonde hair and wearing the same SHIELD uniform he always wore. 

“What are you waiting for?” she asked him in english. She waited a moment but he didn’t say anything. “Your orders are to kill me, aren't they?” 

“Yes.” The agent replied, not taking his eyes off her. 

“Then do it, please, I want this.” She whispered softly to him. She didn’t even try to keep the pleading tone out of her voice. She sounded like a child begging to be held. She wanted, needed to be taken out of her misery. She was an animal that needed to be put down. 

But he didn’t shoot her. 

Instead he lowered his weapon and dropped it to the ground. She studied the look on his face trying to figure out why he hadn’t killed the monster she knew she was. He was harder to read than most but she could still see the look of pity and worry on his face. This confused her. Why would anyone pity her? She was a killer. She didn’t deserve mercy, she never gave any to her targets. The next words out of his mouth shocked her. 

“I want to help you.”

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

She woke with a start. She was breathing fast, could feel her heart pounding away in her chest. She sat up in her bed, pulling the covers around her. She lifted one of her shaking hands to her face and felt the tears that were there. 

Nightmares were nothing new to her. But they still scared her more than she would ever admit. Not even to Clint. How was she supposed to tell him that every night she dreamed of him pointing an arrow at her face ready to kill her. It would hurt him badly, and she would never do anything to hurt her best friend. The man who had saved her life, even if that wasn’t what she had wanted at the time. 

She sat in her bed for a little while longer, trying to calm her breathing. But she couldn’t keep the memory from creeping back into her mind. She always imagined the arrow being sent right threw her. Sometimes she wished that he had. 

She heard a tiny knock at her door making her heart skip a beat. But she knew there was no reason to panic, people trying to cause her harm didn’t knock. It could only be one of the other occupants of the compound. 

She wiped the tears from her face and got to her feet, letting the mask of emotionless slide onto her face. She walked quietly towards the door and put her hand on the doorknob. She contemplated not opening it, but she did anyways. She was surprised to see Wanda standing there. Tears running down the young woman's face. 

“Sorry I didn’t mean to wake you, I can go--” Wanda spit out as soon as she opened the door but she cut her off.

“Don’t worry I wasn’t asleep” she replied, grabbing Wanda’s hand and pulling her into her room, shutting the door behind her. She wasn’t the only one plagued with nightmares of her past. She turned on the light and sat on the edge of her bed, motioning for Wanda to sit next to her. It bothered her to see tears falling down Wanda’s face. 

“Nightmares?” She asked her, not wanting to prod if Wanda didn’t want to talk about it. 

Wanda nodded and wiped away the tears from her face. “It’s always the same. Pietro dies and I can’t do anything to save him. I should have been there.” She confided quietly. 

She pulled her into a hug. “It’s not your fault. Your brother knew what he was doing and what it meant. He made that choice. You can’t blame yourself, he wouldn’t want that.” She told her. She hoped her words were comforting, but she had never really been good at that kind of thing. 

Wanda didn’t respond. And she didn’t know what else to do or say. She wished Clint or Steve were there to help Wanda. They would be able to say comforting words that would make her feel better. Wanda deserved better then her. All she could do was hold her until she fell asleep. So that’s what she did.


	15. Chapter 14: Torture

She looked straight ahead at the judge in front of her. Her emotionless mask already put on her face the moment she stepped into the courthouse. Even though she wasn’t on trial, this is the most scared she had ever been in a courthouse. She wasn’t even this scared when she told the government to kiss her ass a few years ago. 

But now sitting up beside the judge was Madame B. A woman she thought was long dead. But here she was on trial for the crimes she committed in the Red Room. She was glad that she was being prosecuted, but she would rather just have this whole thing disappear. Because now she had to testify against Madame B, because she was the only witness left alive. 

She felt the stares of Tony, Steve, Wanda and Clint burn into the back of her neck. She was thankful for their support in this, but things that none of them knew were going to come out in this trial. Things she hadn’t even told Clint. And now she had to tell the whole world. She wondered for a moment if she could even do it. She quickly shook that thought to the back of her mind. She was the Black Widow. She could do anything. Madame B had taught her that. 

The judges voice snapped her out of her thoughts and back to the trial. “Madame, when did the Red Room Operation begin.?” He asked Madame B, not taking his tired eyes off the paper in front of him. 

“It began in the 1940s but wasn’t successful until the last group of participants in 1985.” Madame B replied. Her icy blue eyes locked onto hers when she said that it was successful. She knew she was the only successful Black Widow that came out of the room. She hated that Madame B had called them participants. They hadn’t made the choice to be a part of the program. They were prisoners. 

“When was the last group of girls taken into the custody of the Red Room?” The old judge asked, doing his best not to look disgusted.

Madame B smiled at her, the smile that gives her nightmares every night. “The last group of girls were taken in 1985 when they were all one year old. They were either taken from orphanages or taken.” Madame B’s eyes were still locked on hers. And she was determined to not look away, she would not give Madame the satisfaction. 

She couldn’t really remember how she got to the Red Room, since she was only one-year old. But she could remember smoke burning her nose and choking her. She could remember screaming. But that was all. She couldn’t remember anything about her parents, she didn’t even know if she had siblings. 

“Can you please name the girls that you took for the program and how many there were?” The judge asked, staring daggers into Madame. He hated her, she could tell. 

“There were twenty-eight of them. Anya, Irina, Yelena, Anastasia, Katina, Annika, Melina, Lada, Tatiana, Manya, Lizabeta, Ivanna, Nina, Kira, Nadia, Alisa…” Madame B paused for a moment, clearly trying to remember more names. “And Natalia, but that is all that I remember.”

She did her best to hide the horror and disgust that she felt towards Madame B. She only remembered seventeen out of the twenty-eight girls that she took. She knew that they all meant nothing more to Madame then weapons. But she could have at least remembered their names. The girls Madame had just listed were ones who survived towards the later years of the training. But she remembered them all. She would always remember her competitors. Her sisters. 

“Ms Romanoff, do you remember the rest of the girls?” The judge asked her. She replied without hesitation. 

“Evva, Irisa, Larissa, Lelya, Mila, Nadka, Nastasia, Olena, Elena, Odessa and Sarra.” She said strongly. Her sisters would be remembered. They would not be forgotten like Madame B had wanted. She could tell without turning around that her friends behind her wore shocked expressions. She had never told them a single name of the other girls in the Red Room. Clint had asked but she had reflected the question and didn’t answer. They probably thought that she didn’t remember. But she did.

She remembered watching Odessa kill Sarra when she was five. She remembers Madame B slitting Evva’s throat when she was three. She remembers Anya, how her best friend had been her first kill when she was six. The Red Room had taken many things from her, but they would never take the memories of her sisters away. No matter how hard they tried. No matter how much they hurt.

Her attention was drawn to a lawyer she didn’t know the name of. He wore a suit and had his hair gelled back. In his hand was a file. 

“Judge, her I have photos taken during the training of the girls in the Red Room, I have also acquired a piece of video to show.” The unknown lawyer said, standing up and going to the projector. 

She froze. She had memories of the Red Room, but she had never seen any photos of her time there, let alone a video. She felt fear fill her body, but she remained still and to anyone else she looked calm. She looked up at the screen as the first picture came up. 

It was a photo of all twenty-eight girls. Almost like a class picture taken at normal schools. They were all two years old in the picture. Even at that young age they had all been in the Red Room for a year and knew what was expected of them. They did not smile. They stood with their hands behind their backs and stared at the camera with cold, empty eyes. They were children, but they didn’t look like it. She quickly spotted herself in the back, it was easy as she was the only child with bright red hair. She looked so afraid. She wanted to look at the picture for hours, memorizing every girls faces and matching them to the names she knew. But all too soon the picture was replaced with another. 

This was a picture taken during Sarra and Odessa’s duel, right before Odessa snapped Sarra’s neck. Odessa’s hands around Sarra’s tiny thoat. Even in the picture you could see the fear in Sarra’s eyes. And the regret and horror in Odessa’s. She saw herself in the background watching, she was holding Anya’s hand. 

Looking at these photos brought back to many memories. She felt herself start to shake and her breathing start to quicken. She tried to stop, tried to hide it. But this was all too much. She wanted to run and hide and never turn back, but she couldn’t tear her eyes away from the screen.

The next picture was put up. This time it was a close up photo of her and Anya. They looked to be about five but she couldn’t be sure. They both had identical braided crowns carefully done. They were in their ballet costumes and tying up their shoes. She remembered those shoes and how the ribbons had to be tied so tight that they dug into her ankles and made them bleed. 

The final photo he showed was of them all in their beds. This time there were only seven of them, all looking to be around sixteen years old. They all stared at the camera, wrists handcuffed to their bedposts. She saw herself in the bed furthest away. Hers had always been the bed farthest from the door. 

She looked down at her hands and saw that they were clenched into fists. Blood dripping down them. She hadn’t even noticed she had dug her nails so deep into her skin. She didn’t even feel the pain. She looked back up at the screen as the video started to play. She dug her nails even harder into the palms of her hands. 

The video was of her. Probably around ten years old. She was wearing a training uniform and standing in a line with all the other surviving girls. Madame B stood in front of them, hammer in hand. She looked exactly the same as she did now. 

“Natalia come forward” the Madame on the video said. She watched in horror as her younger self walked towards Madame B. She knew exactly what this video was of. 

“What is your purpose?” Madame B asked little Natalia. 

“To be the best assassin Russia has ever had.” The little girl replied quickly. 

“Good, what is your place is the world?” Madame B asked, a sadistic glint in her eyes. 

Her younger self looked confused for a moment before answering, “To be the assassin Russia has ever had.” 

She winced as the Madame B in the video grabbed ahold of the young Natalia’s foot bringing the hammer down with a sickening crack. But the young girl did not cry out in pain. She had been trained better than that and was already used to pain far greater than a few broken toes. 

“Wrong, you have no place in the world.”


	16. Chapter 15: Manhandling

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Thanks for all the reads and comments I've been getting. I love to hear your thoughts. Sorry to take a little while to get this chapter up. I try to get one up at least once every two weeks if not more.

She stopped pacing her cell for a moment to adjust the waist of the too big sweatpants she was given to wear. She and the others had been in the raft jail cells for a little over a week now, and if she could use one word to describe how she felt this whole last week would be angry. 

It infuriated her the way that they treated Wanda, like she was some sort of dangerous monster. And yes she was dangerous, but she wasn’t a monster. She hated the way the guards talked to her and Wanda. Always making crude comments about them, especially her. It wasn’t anything she wasn’t used too, but that didn’t change the fact that she would kill every single one of them if she had the chance. 

She knew after her first night here that she could escape. It wouldn’t be easy but she could do it. The problem was getting everyone else out. It would be selfish to leave them all here while she escaped. So she had to be patient and learn the ever changing routine of life down in the Raft. 

So that’s what she did. Pacing her cell, not speaking to anyone. It was all part of her plan. She learned the guards routines and what weapons they had on them. Who had the keys to the cell and how many of them were on the Raft. 

And now she had a plan. And it was a good one, pretty much guaranteed to get them all out of their cells in the Raft. That is if she didn’t die trying. But it would mean tricking not only the guards, but her friends as well. It is what she has to do to get them all out and away from this mess that Steve and Tony created. 

She was pulled out of her thoughts by Clint’s voice calling across to her from his cell. 

“Tasha, come on. Talk to me. Say something so that I know your okay.” His voice sounded desperate. 

She felt bad. She had been ignoring him and the others all week. But she had too if she wanted this plan to work. She didn’t look up from the floor as she went to go sit on the sad excuse of a bed nailed to the wall. She was mentally preparing herself for what she was about to do. It was almost time to put her plan into action. All she had to do was wait for the night shift to start. 

Her plan sounded simple really. She was going to convince the guards that she was sick, leading them to open her cell. Once they did she would attack and purposely lose. She would most certainly be put in a different room for interrogation. Then she would strike for real. The only thing she was worried about was being shot and killed the moment she attacked. The guards were getting trigger happy from the time they spent down here. Taking such risks was something she had been trained to do. It didn’t matter what happened to her as long as the others got out. 

She lay back on her bed, staring up at the ceiling. It was time to act. She closed her eyes and didn’t move. She had to lie like this until the night guards came to give them their dinner. That was about 2 hours away. She decided to pass the time by listening to the conversations of others. It wasn’t hard since they were basically yelling across cells to each other. 

What bothered her was that the topic of their conversation was her. She felt herself bristle with anger. They were talking about her like she wasn’t right there. No matter how angry she felt she kept lying absolutely still. She could not mess up her plan. 

“Clint, what is she doing now?” Sam called across to Clint. He was in the cell to her right so he couldn’t see her. 

“She’s just laying on her bed.” Clint called back, she could hear the concern and frustration in his voice. 

“Is she okay?” Sam asked. He sounded worried too. Something she was surprised by. Even though they worked together during the fall of SHIELD, they weren’t close. 

“Natasha, tell us your alright.” Wanda called out from the cell beside Clint. 

She almost jumped up from the bed at that moment. The young woman had been almost as silent as she has the past few days. The hurtful remarks from the guards obviously affecting her. She wasn’t used to being talked about like that, like she was an object. But she stayed laying on the bed. This plan had to work. 

\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The 2 hours seemed to fly by much too quickly. She felt her heartbeat start to quicken as the slot opened to slide her tray of food in. 

“Eat up pretty girl.” One of the guards said with a laugh as he slid her tray through the slot. 

She stayed exactly where she was and didn’t move. The guard didn’t like that. 

“Come on babe, come get your food I want to see that body of yours.” The guard teased. She decided she was going to kill him first. 

She sat up on her bed and swung her legs over the side, making sure to sway a little and look as sick and frail as she could. She knew her acting was working as her friends in the other cells walked up to the bars to get a closer look at her. She felt a pang of guilt. But this was for their own good.

She shakenly got to her feet and took one step before dramatically falling to the floor. She heard Clint and Wanda call out her name as she hit the cement floor of her cell. 

“Shit. Terry, John come over here, little red passed out.!” The guard at her cell called to the others. 

She smiled internally as she heard the jingle of his keys as he took them out of his pocket. Even as he opened her cell and the three guards walked in she stayed where she was sprawled out on the floor. That is until they got close enough. 

She knew that there were three guards in her cell, leaving nine more active on the Raft. Even though she was planning to pretend to get caught, she still had to make it look somewhat believable. She was the Black Widow after all. 

Without any warning she sprang up off the ground, swinger her legs around the guard who first brought her food neck. She spun around and swung him into the other two guards, breaking his neck and killing him. 

A fourth guard came running into her cell pointing a gun at her, he let off a shot but she easily dodged out of the way. She made sure to break his arm and disarm him seconds after. She shot him in the head before turning around and shooting the two other guards she knocked over as they got to their feet. In a span of 30 seconds, she had left four people dead. Just more red in her ledger. 

Even though the gun she had still had bullets she threw it to the cell floor before sprinting out of the cell into the center of the Raft. She was instantly surrounded by the other eight guards pointing guns at her. It was now time for the dreaded part two of the plan. 

She launched herself at the guards and managed to get in a few good hits before she heard a shot ring out. The sound of the bullet being fired seemed to hit her ears long before the bullet lodged itself in her right knee.   
She fell to the ground without a sound. Aware of the shouts from Clint, Sam, Wanda and Scott screaming out not to hurt her. But it was too late. As she lay on the ground pretending to be much more hurt than she was, she couldn’t help but be concerned about where she was shot. 

She hoped she would be shot in the shoulder, or side or something like that, but she didn’t need to look at her knee to know that the bullet had shattered her kneecap. Sure she could fight through the pain and get the job done, but it would be 10x harder than originally planned. 

She lay still on the ground with her eyes closed. She could easily fool the guards into thinking she was unconscious. Even in pain it was easy not to make any noise as the guards put handcuffs on her and left her lying on the ground, trying to decide what to do with her. 

She choose to retreat into her head. Giving herself the excuse that she did this to further convince those around her that she was unconscious. But deep down she knew it was to protect herself from the screams of her friends probably thinking she was dead. 

She focused on the feeling of the warm blood sweeping through her sweatpants. Turning the light grey fabric into a dark red. She could feel the shards of bone poking in to her skin where they shouldn’t be. She wondered for a moment if she would be able to stand at all. But the whisper of Madame B’s voice that had taken a home in the back of her mind quickly reminded her that pain is temporary. She would get through it. She always did. 

She felt arms around her and realized that the guards had decided what they were going to do. Took them long enough. She braced herself as the arms of the men lifted her up. Obviously not caring about the pain that would cause her. She stifled a gasp and let her head loll onto on of the guards shoulder. 

They walked for a few minutes. Taking two lefts and then a right. She heard a door open and assumed that the men walked through. Suddenly without any warning the guard carrying her tossed her on to the ground in the middle of the room. 

She still needed to make them believe that she was knocked out so she let herself tumble painfully onto the concrete. Even after she heard the door close and the voices of the guards disappear she didn’t move. Not even to open her eyes. There could be cameras watching her. All she could do was wait until the guards came back to make her move.


	17. Chapter 16: Bedridden

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, don't worry I'm back I would never abandon this. The new semester at school started and I found myself falling behind and struggling to maintain my grades. So I didn't have much time to write. I'm going to try and update at least once every 2 weeks, I don't want to rush these chapters. The quality of my writing matters a lot to me. Comments really help and ideas would be appreciated.

He had told her after their short conversation in the helicarrier hallway that he would be back to check on her in an hour. As he rounded the corner he was surprised to still see her leaning up against the wall. Her knees pulled to her chest, the same position she had been in before. He had half expected that she would have moved to a different place to avoid him finding her again. But she hadn’t. Whether it was a choice or if she really was just too injured to move from that spot without causing a lot of pain. 

It had been about 6 hours since Tony, Sam and him had rescued Natasha, Rhodey and Wanda from where they had been taken hostage. In that time Wanda and Rhodey had given them all a full debrief on what had occurred during their compromised mission. 

They had been captured for a little over two days. Wanda had told them that to help her and Rhodey safe she had made herself a target to the men holding them hostage. After a few hours they had dragged Natasha into a different room and Wanda and Rhodey didn’t see her or their captures for the rest of the time. 

Maria then filled them in on where she and Fury had found Natasha, chains around her wrists attaching her to the wall of a tiny room. She had been naked. Now even after Rhodey and Wanda had seen the doctors and been cleared of nothing more than a few bruises, Natasha had still refused to see them. Instead she seemed to have made a home against the wall of an empty hallway. 

She turned her head to look at him as he sat down beside her. But she quickly brought her eyes back to the wall in front of her. Not saying anything. Not even some sarcastic remark she was known for. He was silent for a few minutes, not really sure what to say to her. He wished Clint was here. 

“Here’s the deal.” He said, trying not to sound like he was ordering her, even though that was what he was doing. “You can either go see medical or when we get back to the compound you let me take a look at you.” 

He watched her face as she considered her options. He looked for some sort of emotion but her face was just that emotionless mask he knew all to well. 

“I’m not going to medical.” She responded softly, not turning to look at him. 

“Alright, then we will be landing at the compound in about 20 minutes.” He told her. He considered leaving then but decided against it. He remembered when she had come to see if he was okay after Peggy’s funeral. She had been his rock when he felt like the world was slipping away from him. 

“We have what we have when we have it.”

Those words she had said to him stuck. He repeated them over and over in his head. He knew how quickly things could change. How one morning you could be having coffee with someone and then a few hours later they are dead. He needed to stop living in the past. And she was teaching him to do that. 

He looked at her, actually looked at her. He looked past the mask and into her warm green eyes. And for the first time he saw the pain in them. He saw the sadness, he saw the fear. He reached down and grabbed her hand with his. Her head whipped around to look at him. Confusion on her face, but she didn’t pull away. Instead, after a moment of hesitation, she rested her head against his shoulder. He put his other arm around her and pulled her close. It didn’t feel awkward. It felt comfortable, safe. He found himself wishing he could hold her like this forever. 

They stayed like that until someone came over a speaker informing them that they had arrived at the compound. He couldn’t help but be disappointed. But he needed to look over Natasha and make sure she was okay. It did concern him that she was letting him hold her like this. 

“Come on, let's go take a look at you.” He said letting go of her hand. When she didn’t make a move to get up he put his arm under her legs and lifted her up into his arms. It reminded him of the time the building collapsed on them back during the fall of SHIELD. That felt so far away now, like it happened years ago. 

As he walked out of the helicarrier into the compound, Natasha buried her face into his chest. His worry about her wellbeing grew with every step he took. This was very unlike the hardcore assasin he had grown to love. He wondered for a moment if he should take her to her room or his. But he decided it would be safer to take her to his. He had never been in her room in the compound before and didn’t want to intrude on her privacy, plus he knew where everything was in his room. He opened the door, went in and closed it behind him. Even though she was covered in dirt and blood he didn’t hesitate to lay her down on his bed. He wanted her to be comfortable, he could easily get new sheets. 

“Wanda and Rhodey told me what happened. That they took you somewhere else.” He paused. He didn’t know what to say. He didn’t want to upset or offended her but he also needed to know that she wasn’t too badly hurt. Because from the looks of it, she was. “Nat, what happened those two days?”.

“Nothing that hasn’t happened before, Steve. Don’t worry about me, I’ve had worse.” She responded. It hurt him to know that those kinds of things happened to her. He knew she could protect herself, but sometimes he wished she would just let him take care of her. He didn’t have to protect her, but he wanted to.

He left her on the bed and walked into the bathroom, turning on the bath water. “I know things like this have happened to you before Nat, but that doesn’t make them any less painful. You're tough, but even Avengers have their breaking points, and that’s okay.” He said, running his hand under the water to make sure it was the perfect temperature. 

Natasha didn’t say anything, so he waited for the bath to fill before turning off the water and walking back over to the bed and sitting on the edge of it. He finally let himself look her over for her injuries, the obvious and the not so obvious. 

The black SHIELD sweater and grey sweatpants she got on the helicarrier were clean, except for patches of blood that had soaked through. It was hard to see her injuries through them. She had a cut above her eye that had long dried. There were dark purple bruises on her neck, he tried not to think about how they got there. But he couldn’t help it and felt his anger at her captures grow. 

She looked exhausted, he realized that she probably hadn’t slept the whole time she was locked up. Dark bags under her eyes made it look like she had been punched in the face. Maybe she had been. 

“Any injuries you know of?” He asked her giving her a look that said, don’t lie to me. She seemed to have gotten the message.

“My knee was dislocated but I popped it back in, I have at least 2 broken ribs, maybe more.” she responded, but Steve knew that she hadn’t told him all of them. 

“Come on Nat.” He couldn’t help but let his annoyance slide into his voice.

“Definitely a concussion and lots of cuts and bruises, some probably needing stitches but I can do that myself and..” She looked away from him. “I think my wrist might be broken.”

“Natasha” He sighed, frustrated with himself at not seeing how badly she was injured. “You really need to get to medical.”

“No!” she practically yelled. A look of pain crossed her face but quickly disappeared. She took a moment to collect herself before continuing, “You promised I wouldn’t have to go Steve.”

He studied her face. She looked afraid. He didn’t know what made her so scared of medical but he didn’t have to think hard to know it had something to do with her upbringing in the Red Room. 

“Okay” He finally decided. He knew how badly she was hurt those last few days, physically and emotionally. He didn’t want to hurt her anymore. “Let’s get you cleaned up, alright?”. He gestured to the bathroom that housed the warm bath. 

Once she nodded her head in agreement he picked her up off the bed and gathered her in his arms. She felt so small. So fragile. He slowly went into the bathroom, doing his best not to jostle her. He didn’t want to accidently do more damage. 

He sat down on the floor and lay her in his lap. She didn’t say anything as he gently tugged off the black sweatshirt. He couldn’t help the look of anger on his face when he saw the bruises on her bare chest. His hand ghosted over the dark purple bruises flowering over her ribcage. He didn’t need a doctor to know that there was more then two broken ribs. 

He slid off her pants and noticed that she had started to shiver. He hadn’t realized it would be cold without the safety of her clothing. 

“Sorry Nat.” He whispered, picking her up and gently laying her in the warm water. By the time she hit the water her eyes were already closed. He could tell by the slow rise and fall of her chest that she was asleep. Either she was just so exhausted that she had passed out or she felt safe enough with him to fall asleep. He hoped it was the latter. 

As he combed the blood and dirt out of her matted hair he couldn’t help but notice how much he loved her.


	18. Chapter 17: Drugged

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I highly suggest listening to the Russian Lullaby included in this chapter. It is haunting.

It was careless. A mistake she wouldn’t have made back when she was under the thumb of the KGB. Life in the Western world was making her soft. When she got out of the situation her carelessness had gotten her in, she would make sure to remind herself of the brutal training that had turned her into such a success. 

She and Clint were on a mission in Kiev. To take down a HYDRA base that had sprung up. She didn’t know then that it had been a trap. HYDRA’s why of luring her out. They had been waiting. And she didn’t know until it was too late. 

Things had been going well. She and Clint had taken down almost all of the opretives, or so they had been lead to believe. They had splitten up to gather intel. She had entered a security room. The minute she stepped foot in there, a feeling of unease spread over her. But she didn’t have time to act on it. 

Men in masks jumped out from the shadows and before she could even get on hit in she felt a prick in the back of her neck. Then the cold of the drug flowing through her veins. The last thing she remembered was the realization that her head had hit the floor. She should have blocked the man from drugging her. She wondered what had happened to Clint.

She didn’t know how long she had been out before she woke. The moment she opened her eyes a wave of nausea coursed through her. She closed her eyes again and waited for it to pass. The last thing she wanted was to throw up in whatever place they had put her. 

She gradually opened her eyes again to take in her surroundings. The room was dark. And the ceiling seemed to be, swaying? No that can’t be right. She blinked a few times, trying to clear her vision but it wouldn’t work. The ceiling looked like it was right in front of her face one second, and miles away the next. Whatever drug they had given her must of been strong. 

It was then that she noticed that she had been tied up. It scared her that she hadn’t noticed before. What was wrong with her? Her wrists were tied tightly behind her back. Her fingers felt numb and she couldn’t tell if it was from the drug or poor circulation. She hoped it was the drugs. Her ankles were the same story. In a lucid state these bindings would be easy to get out of, but in her current state she may of well have been tied with steel. 

She struggled to roll onto her side. She couldn’t bear looking at the cement ceiling any longer. But as soon as she did she wished she hadn’t. There in the corner of the cement room was a little girl. Huddled in the corner. The whole room swayed, but her eyes were able to focus on the girl. Was the girl real? She hoped she wasn’t.

She tried to call out to the girl but nothing escaped her mouth. The girl was wearing a white cotton dress. It didn’t have a single stain on it. For some reason the dress seemed familiar to her. Like she had seen it before. The girl had her knees pulled to her chest. Her face was buried against her chest. She was crying. Her boney shoulders bobbing with every sob. 

She couldn’t take her eyes off her as the girl raised her head to look at her. If she had been capable of screaming she would have, but the drug seemed to have taken away her voice. The girl stared at her. Her mousy brown hair framing her face. Tears streaming down her pale cheeks. But she recognized her. She knew that face. 

The girl in the corner was Irene Drakov. The girl she and Karina had been sent to kill. Irene had been 10. She and Karina had only been 14. 

She stared unblinking at Irene. The innocent child she had killed when she had only been a child herself. This wasn’t real. It was a hallucination. Suddenly blood started pouring from little Irene’s throat. Spilling down her dress. The one she had been wearing on the fateful day. 

She pulled weakly at her restraints. She had to get to Irene. She had to stop the bleeding, she had to save her! She looked at Irene’s face. Tears pouring down and mixing into the crimson blood. Irene screamed. Her screams gurgled because of the wound at her throat. She couldn’t save Irene. She had already killed her. 

The blood had turned Irene’s beautiful white dress a dark red. But the blood was still streaming out. She frantically tried to drag herself away as the little girl’s blood flowed towards her. The uneven ground beneath her scratched her skin badly. Suddenly her back hit the wall behind her and she couldn’t go any further. The blood covered her. She felt the slickness of the blood as it coated her hands. She was glad they were behind her back so she didn’t have to see them. She couldn’t get away. Irene’s screams were deafening and she desperately wished she could cover her ears. 

As soon as they started Irene’s desperate screams stopped. She could only watch as Irene gathered herself off the ground and walked towards her. Irene stopped just inches away from her. 

“Я только хотела быть твоей подругой, Наталья” (I had only wanted to be your friend, Natalia) Irene’s voice was a whisper. The mission of Irene’s murder sprung back to her head. Like she had just done it yesterday. 

She and Karina had tricked the little girl into thinking they were going to be friends. Irene didn’t know how badly she wished that was true. Back then she had wanted friends. But was always told how dangerous they were. 

Irene was an innocent little girl. And she had killed her. She was a monster. That is all she ever would be. Her ledger would never be clear. She noticed that tears were streaming down her own face. She briefly wondered how long she had been crying. Who was watching her. 

She shut her eyes tight. Desperately wanting Irene to go away. How would she ever be able to let Irene know that she was sorry. She was so sorry. 

After a few minutes she noticed that she could no longer feel the blood on her hands, or hear Irene’s screams. Slowly she opened her eyes. But what she saw caused her to shut them immediately. There was another little girl in the corner. Where Irene had been. But this time she only needed a glance to know who it was. 

The little girl was in the same position as Irene had been. But she was wearing a tattered ballerina’s costume. Point shoes on her feet, stained red. The little girl was dirty and she looked starved. She was starved. Her ribs clearly visible through the leotard. Her hair was a flaming red. 

It was her. When she was younger, maybe 5 or 6. 

She refused to open her eyes again. She did not want to see the abused child she had been. Who she still was. 

She noticed a tune start to play. And she recognized it almost immediately. 

Тили-тили-бом  
Закрой глаза скорее,  
Кто-то ходит за окном,  
И стучится в двери.  
(Tili Tili Bom  
Close your eyes quickly  
Someone's walking by the window  
And knocking at the door.)

A child’s voice sang the words that she hadn’t heard in years. It was her. The little Natalia in the corner was singing. Trying to sooth her. 

Тили-тили-бом.  
Кричит ночная птица.  
Он уже пробрался в дом.  
К тем, кому не спится.

Он идет...  
Он уже  
близко...  
(Tili Tili Bom  
Can you hear the birds through the night?  
He's already made his way into the house  
For those who cannot sleep

Hear his steps  
He's already  
Close)

She didn’t notice when she had joined little Natalia in singing the old lullaby. But she could easily hear her graveled deeper voice mix with the childs. 

Тили-тили-бом.  
Ты слышишь, кто-то рядом?  
Притаился за углом,  
И пронзает взглядом.

Тили-тили-бом.  
Все скроет ночь немая.  
За тобой крадется он,  
И вот-вот поймает.

Он идет...  
Он уже  
близко...  
(Tili Tili Bom  
Can you hear someone next to you ?  
Huddled in a corner  
With a penetrating gaze

Tili Tili Bom  
The night will muffle everything  
He is sneaking up to you  
Now he almost got you..

Hear his steps  
He's already  
Close)

She wished she was dead. 

Тили-тили-бом.  
Ты слышишь, кто-то рядом?  
Притаился за углом,  
И пронзает взглядом.  
(Tili Tili Bom  
Can you hear someone next to you ?  
Huddled in a corner  
With a penetrating gaze)


	19. Hostage

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! about time I updated! Probably will be writing more during all this self-isolation stuff. Speaking of which, stay inside and stay safe. Just because you have a low risk doesn't mean that you can't spread it to the elderly or the immune-compromised. I'm immune-compromised myself and am thankful for those who stay inside.

“Barton, Romanoff, you got some hostiles heading your way” Tony’s voice said over the comm. 

She and Clint immediately pressed themselves against the concrete wall of the abandoned warehouse. She listened to the footsteps approaching. The dull thumps of boots against the ground let her know that there were at least three hostiles coming quickly towards them. She waited until they were just about to turn the corner before flashing a quick smirk at Clint and jumping into action. 

In less than 5 seconds all three hostiles were taken care of. She had shot the two on the right while Clint shot an arrow through the stomach of the other. They were an incredible team. The Hawk and The Widow. 

“You know this is a lot more fun than I thought it would be.” she laughed as she and Clint continued down the hallway. The Avengers had gotten a call to bust a drug ring that was proving to be a bit difficult for the FBI. They weren’t really doing anything that day and decided it would be a good training exercise for the team. 

“Feels good to get rid of a few bad guys.” Clint replied with a smile just as wide as her own. “Got a new superhero story for the kiddos.” He joked. 

“Oh ya I’m sure Laura would love to hear you tell your children about how you broke up a drug ring in an abandoned warehouse.” She said sarcastically. She could imagine the look on Laura’s face while he told Lila and Cooper about why bad guys loved cocaine. 

“Hey!” Clint exclaimed, playfully bumping her with his elbow. “Obviously I would just tell them about the cool Avenger part. I’ll tell them about cocaine when they're older.” Clint finished with a laugh.

“Come on, Cap!” Sam’s voice crackled through the comm, “Let me throw the shield! Just once!”

Clint was quick to add in his own two cents, “If Sam gets to throw it so do I!”

“Dido!” Tony added. 

“And that is why no one gets to throw the shield except me.” Steve’s annoyed voice replied over the comm. 

She couldn’t help but smile at the sound of their conversation. Like siblings bickering over who’s turn it was with a toy. She was about to remind him that she had thrown the shield during their battle with Ultron but was quickly cut off by Wanda’s panicked voice in her ear. 

“Everyone to the main area of the warehouse, we have a hostage situation.”

She turned and locked eyes with Clint. The amusement from seconds ago quickly forgotten.

“What is happening over there, Wanda?” She asked, needing to know every detail that the young woman was seeing. 

“Their leader has a gun to the head of one of the policemen on scene, saying he will kill him unless we let him and the rest of his crew go.” she replied quickly, knowing the gravity of the situation. 

“Well that’s not gonna happen.” Tony’s annoyed voice replied. “And I was just starting to have fun.”

“Tony, You me and Sam will go and meet Wanda and try to distract them. Nat, you and Barton go behind and do what you need to do.” Cap directed over the comm. His voice got deadly serious before saying, “We can’t have any civilian casualties.”

She and Clint immediately jumped into action, turning around and running down the hallway they just came. That would lead them to a place where they would be behind the man with the gun. They made sure that their feet made no sound as they ran. Skills that felt so natural after their years of experience. She made sure to reload her gun as they ran, she didn’t know how many she would need. Or if she would need it at all. 

Time seemed to slow down as they ran to their position. It always did when she was so focused on a mission. In the few minutes it took to get to the door by the back of the main room every possibility of the next few crucial minutes went through her head. She was sure they were going through Clint’s head as well. 

They stood by the door behind the man. They could see him, but he couldn’t see them. She waited a moment and took in the scene in front of her. 

The man was on the heavier side and holding a gun to the policemen’s head, which he had in a headlock. She didn’t have to see the policeman’s face to know the fear that he was feeling. The man’s eyes were locked on the rest of her teammates, who were trying to convince him to put the gun down. But she could tell right away that he wasn’t going to do that. She turned to Clint and gave him a nod, letting him know that it was time to take the shot, they had no other choice. 

She watched as Clint drew an arrow and lined up his shot. She wasn’t worried. He never missed. Her eyes followed the arrow as he let if fly. It buried itself in the back of the man’s head, killing him instantly. No matter how bad the guy was, Clint never wanted to make people suffer. She admired that about him. She turned her eyes away from where the rest of her teammates were pulling the policeman to safety and gathering the rest of the bad guys to be locked away.   
“Not gonna tell that part to your kids either, huh.” She remarked to Clint, who was still staring at the body of the man he had just killed. 

“Definitely not”.


	20. Chapter 19: Exhaustion

She was a spy. Some would say the best spy the world had ever seen. But even she had her limits, whether she would admit it or not. She was used to running on next to no sleep on missions, catching a few hours between each meetup or extraction but this mission had worn her down.

She had been dropped off in the Ireland countryside three days ago and since then she had had about 4 hours of sleep. Between finding the information she needed, tracking down the man she needed to find and neutralizing the threat she just didn’t find the time to rest. But now the mission was over and she was heading to her extraction point. Slowly. 

Those last three days had brought her to now. Walking through the rolling hills of Ireland. Looking around she had to admit, it was beautiful. The sun had just started to set, casting a golden filter on the land around her. It was warm, with a slight wind that brought a cool breeze through her hair. 

She stopped for a moment and closed her eyes. She breathed in the fresh smells of grass and flowers the breeze stirred around. Even though she spent so much time in New York and DC, she always did prefer the countryside over the busy cities. She couldn’t help but wish she could stay in these hills forever. They brought a feeling of peace that she so rarely could find. 

She opened her tired eyes and glanced down at her watch. The glass on the watch face had been cracked but thankfully it was still functioning. The little hands told her that it was 7:15. She sighed. She was supposed to be at her extraction point at 8pm. Somehow she had to finish walking 4 hours in 45 minutes. As exhausted as she was, there was no way that was going to happen. 

She let her arms drop tiredly to her sides and looked around at the hills once more. Without thinking about it much she let her knees buckle and drop her to the ground. There was no point trying to get there, it wasn’t going to happen. She was just too tired. 

Her head ached, she didn’t know if it was from exhaustion, dehydration or a concussion. Probably all three. Her eyes felt dry and she was struggling to keep them open. As she kneeled there in the soft grass she couldn’t help but let her mind wander. 

Her life had started to feel like an endless cycle. Go on a mission, go back for a debriefing and then be sent out on another. Over and over and over again. Sure she enjoyed the mission sometimes, but she often thought about how it would end. 

Other people were caught up in worry about how they were going to die. But she knew how it would end. She wasn’t going to get sick and die, she wasn’t going to die of old age. She knew it would be out on a mission. 

She would get shot, and wouldn’t be lucky enough to survive it. She would be captured by her enemies and tortured to death. She would be injured and die in the woods somewhere in a forigen country. She would die alone, that much was true. She would die and her body would never be found, no one would know what had happened to her. Her memory would just fade away until she was nothing more than a ghost story. 

She didn’t want to die like that, but she knew that with the lifestyle she led it would be inevitable. Just like her parents, she would be a forgotten tomb stone overgrown by weeds by a chain link fence. Except she would have no one looking for her. The Red Room made sure of that. She had no family, the Romanov name would die here with her. 

A few years ago that wouldn’t have bothered her. But she was an Avenger now. She had friends, and she was Auntie Nat. She had people that cared about her and would want to know what had happened to her. 

The sun had just about set, the golden rays falling down behind the sky. Without the sun the cool breeze had started to chill her. She lay down in the grass and stared up at the sky. A vast canvas of purples and pinks fading into black. She could just faintly see stars speckle the sky. 

She sighed. She was just so tired. Her whole body felt heavy and her eyes felt so dry. She just wanted to sleep. She felt safe here in the grass, surrounded by the purple and blue flowers growing protectively around her. Shielding her from the enemies that always seemed to be just steps behind her. She was tired of running. Death always seemed to be right at her doorstep. 

But here, she was safe. She just didn’t know how long it would last. She didn’t want to think about it. She closed her tired eyes and let herself be drifted off to sleep by the sweet smells on the Ireland countryside.   
\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was still night when she woke. At first she didn’t know what had disturbed her, but then she heard the whir of a helicopter. She jumped to her feet and looked up at the sky. It didn’t take her long to see a black helicopter flying towards her, a light shining down from it. Panic shot through her at first, but as the helicopter got closer she saw the S.H.I.E.L.D logo painted on the side. 

She breathed a tired sigh of relief. She looked down at her watch and saw that only a few hours had passed since she fell asleep. No wonder she was still tired. But there was no time to rest now, the extraction had found her and now the cycle of her life was to begin again. She couldn’t help but be a bit disappointed. 

She reached into her belt and pulled out a little light kept there for just this purpose. She lifted it over her head and turned it on. It flashed a bright white light, a clear signal to the helicopter. After a few seconds the helicopter picked up speed and came towards her. Once she knew the pilot had seen her she turned the light off and put it back in her belt. 

She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself as the wind from the helicopter sent shivers up her spine. Her hair blew around her face and she could barely see the ladder being lowered down to her through the red flames dancing across her vision. 

She tiredly walked towards it and grabbed it. She paused a moment to gather some strength and energy before beginning to climb it. Her arms burned and her legs felt like lead weights but she managed to get up. As she reached the top a familiar hand shot out and grabbed her own, pulling her into the safety of the helicopter. 

As soon as her feet hit the hard floor she collapsed into a chair. She watched as Clint rolled the ladder back up and pushed it to the side, then they were on their way.

“You're late.” Clint said as he dropped into the seat next to her.

“Sorry.” She responded dryly, all she wanted to do right now was sleep.

“Run into any problems?” Clint asked curiously, he knew it wasn’t like her to miss an extraction without a reason.

She turned and looked at him. “Just tired.” She responded with a tired smile. She closed her eyes again and rested her head against the wall. They were silent for a few moments.

She opened her eyes again. “Clint?” She asked.

“Yeah?” He responded, turning to look at her again. 

“I don’t want to die alone.”


	21. Chapter 20: Concussion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! sorry I know its been about a month since I last updated but my mental health hasn't been great lately and I wanted to take a bit more time creating the storylines of each chapter! Anyway I plan on updated more regularly but I guess we'll see what happens lol.

Steve watched Natasha and Wanda from the platform above the training arena, staring in awe at the way Natasha was teaching Wanda to fight. Wanda had only started learning last week, so Natasha was just showing her some basic defense moves, but he still couldn’t take his eyes off her flawless form. She moved like she had been born with the knowledge of these maneuvers, and in some ways she had been. She moved with such confidence and grace that never failed to mesmerize him, though today he couldn’t help but notice that her movements were a bit more tired, it was the smallest hint of tiredness, but he took note of it anyways. He knew a bit more about her past now that S.H.I.E.L.D had fallen and they had begun to spend more time together. 

She never talked much about her past, how she came to be the famous Black Widow, his information came from little comments she said and the few documents released during the vanquishing of S.H.I.E.L.D, he knew the Red Room was a cruel place, that they had taken Natasha when she was just three years old, training her to be the best assassin. He knew they were handcuffed to their beds, he knew there had been twenty-eight girls to start, he didn’t want to think about what had happened to them. What Natasha’s trainers, captures, made them do. 

He wanted to respect Natasha’s privacy, so he never did ask her anything from her past, just told her events from his own before the war. But he was beginning to think it was just hurting her more than helping. After every story he told, whether to her directly or just at something like a group dinner, she grew quite. Sometimes Sam or Wanda would notice, but when they asked her if she was alright she just flashed a smile and told them to stop asking her such a silly question. But he was starting to be able to see through that once impenetrable mask, he could see the hurt pooling in her emerald eyes. 

“Come on Wanda, I know you're tired but that’s no excuse for being sloppy!” He heard Natasha call out, swiping Wanda’s foot out from under her, knocking her to the mat, as she apparently failed to get out of the way. 

“We’ve been at this for awhile, and I still can’t seem to get it! There’s no point!” Wanda yelled back from the floor, frustration clear in her voice. She was young, and still quick to anger. 

Steve watched silently from his spot, watching what was unfolding between the two women below him. He could see a faint red haze starting to flow from Wanda’s fingers. He had been doing his best to help her gain more control over her powers, but she was still far from mastering them. He hoped that Natasha would calm Wanda down, give her a break, but he could tell from her body language that Natasha was frustrated as well. 

“You will never get it if you just give up!” Natasha shouted back, “You wanted to be on this team, you want to fight, so you need to learn how! Your powers aren’t going to protect you from everything!”

Wanda got up quickly from where she was sitting on the ground and turned her back to Natasha, hands covering her ears. Natasha noticed too.

Steve watched as the tension from Natasha’s shoulders disappeared as quickly as it came, a defeated look briefly showing upon her face as she took in Wanda’s distressed form. He knew Natasha hadn’t meant to upset her. He stared at Natasha for a moment, he could tell she was debating what to do. Eventually she took a few steps forward and put her hand on Wanda’s shoulder. Unfortunately this startled the young witch. 

He couldn’t do anything as red energy washed over Natasha like a wave, taking her lithe body with it and slamming her hard against the opposite wall of the training gym. She crumpled on the wood floor beneath her and didn’t move. 

He heard a strangled cry come from where he knew Wanda was standing in shock, but he didn’t even turn his head in her direction. His eyes hadn’t left Natasha from the moment he saw that wave of red rush towards her. He couldn’t take his eyes off her motionless form laying on the ground. Only a second passed before he ran down the steps towards her, but it felt like hours that he was standing there staring at her body. Matching Wanda’s look of distress and fear. 

Once he got to her he dropped to his knees and froze a moment, taking in the scene before him. She was crumpled on the ground in such a way that reminded him of the ragdoll Bucky’s little sister Becca used to carry around. Her eyes were closed, blood pouring down her pale face and mixing with her hair, blending into its natural colour. He couldn’t help but notice the dark purple bags under her eyes, almost like bruises. 

He gently cupped the side of her face in his hand, being as careful as he could, not wanting to hurt her. He quickly scanned his eyes down her injured body, looking for any serious damage. He didn’t see anything that alarmed him other than the gash on her forehead, but that didn’t mean nothing was injured internally. 

“Natasha?” He whispered gently, hoping with every bone in his body that she would open her eyes and let him know she was alright. He waited, holding his breath, but she didn’t move an inch. 

“Wanda! Go and get Sam, tell him to get here quickly!” He called back to Wanda, still not taking his gaze off Natasha. He cringed at the crack in his voice. He paused a moment but didn’t hear any movement from Wanda. 

“Wanda! Quick, go!” He shouted, ripping his eyes off Natasha and sending Wanda a look that screamed for her to get help. He was relieved that that finally seemed to encourage Wanda to go get Sam. 

As Wanda went for help he turned back to Natasha and softly placed his hand over the wound on her forehead, doing what little he could while they waited for Sam to stop the bleeding. With the other hand he carefully ran his fingers through Natasha’s fiery hair in what he hoped was an act of comfort. For a second he thought he saw her mouth twitch, but he couldn’t say for sure if it was real or just a fragment of his hopeful mind. 

As he waited for Sam he continued to run his fingers through her hair, whispering to her that she would be alright and that he was with her, but he had no idea if she could even hear him. A thousand anxious thoughts ran wild through his imagination. What if she was seriously hurt? What if she never woke up? What if she had brain damage and would never be the bold-faced Natasha that he knew and even though he hadn’t admitted it to her, loved?

Those worries ran ramped until he heard the sound of the training room door fly open and the sound of hurried footsteps. He swung his head towards the sound and was beyond relieved to see Sam rushing over to him carrying a first aid kit. He was thankful that Wanda wasn’t with him. He didn’t want her to see the damage she had accidentally done. 

“Jesus dude, is she alright?” Sam asked, kneeling next to him and placing the kit on the ground to open it. 

“I don’t know, she has a pretty bad gash on her head and she hasn’t woken up, other than that I don’t see anything, but that doesn’t mean she isn’t hurt inside.” Steve replied breathlessly, he couldn’t seem to get enough air in his lungs. 

Sam said nothing as he reached into the first aid kit and grabbed hold of one of Tony’s newer inventions, something he was exceptionally grateful for in moments like these. It was a little scanner that could sense every and all injuries on a person in just seconds. Reluctantly he took his hands off Natasha and prayed to a god he barely believed in that she wasn’t seriously hurt. 

The few seconds Sam scanned her body seemed to inch by. The beeps the scanner made slamming into his eardrums like gunshots. Suddenly the beeping stopped and he glanced up at Sam so fast he could swear he had given himself whiplash. He watched Sam’s face as he read the results, waiting for any indication of what was wrong with her. 

Sam gave a sigh of relief. “Looks like she’s got a pretty nasty concussion, that wound on her forehead and some bruised ribs but other than that she’ll be just fine.” Sam told him, placing the scanner back in the first aid kit for the next time something like this undoubtably happened. 

The relief he felt consume his body was one of the best feelings in the world. Now that he wasn’t afraid of causing more damage to her, he scooped up her limp body and cradled her tenderly in his arms. He paid no mind to the blood that began to stain his shirt. Natasha would be alright and that was all that mattered to him at that moment. 

Sam picked up the first aid kit and swung it over his shoulder. “We’re lucky, it easily could have been much worse.” He said grimly. “Vision is with Wanda, she’s obviously pretty shaken, I’m going to go up and talk with her, you got this under control?”

“Ya I got it, make sure you remind her that it wasn’t her fault, accidents happen and Natasha is alright.” He replied, deciding that he would also talk to Wanda later. The last thing he wanted was for her to be afraid of the power that was within her. 

He speed walked past Sam and into the elevator, taking care not to jostle Natasha. The glass doors closed and he requested for the elevator to take them to his floor. Just then it occurred to him that maybe Natasha would prefer her own floor, but he didn’t know where anything was, he had also never been on her floor before. And felt wrong to go up there without her inviting him, even injured as she was. 

So when the elevator deposited them on his floor he wasted no time in heading to the guest bedroom across the hallway from his. He had always assumed that the first person to use this guest room would be Bucky, not an injured Natasha. But he couldn’t think about that now. 

He carefully laid her on the pristine white sheets, not caring about the red blotches that would undoubtedly stain them. He brushed a thumb lightly over her cheek before hurrying to the bathroom to get the first aid kit that he knew was under the sink. 

As he headed back to Natasha’s side, he couldn’t help but notice how small she looked laid out on the king size bed, a slow trickle of blood sweeping into the sheets. He couldn’t really put words to it but she looked tired. Scared. Defeated. A young woman in need of protection. Before he would never have thought of Natasha as in need of protection or scared, but these last few months he wasn’t so sure. He had seen that confident mask slip too often. He didn’t know if it was because she was trusting him more or if she was hurting just that much.

He tried to shake away those thoughts and put the first aid kit on the bedside table next to the bed, taking a seat on the edge of the mattress close to her head. He opened it and took out a cloth and some antiseptic, opening the small bottle and pouring some onto the cloth. He hesitated a moment before gently pressing it to the cut on her forehead. 

He noticed her wince a little but still didn’t open her eyes. He worked delicately to clean the wound, he was pleased to see it had finally stopped bleeding. He also tried to wipe some of the blood off her pale face, but there was little he could do about the blood matted in her hair. 

As he turned to grab a bandage from the kit he heard a soft moan come from Natasha. So quiet if he didn’t have his super soldier hearing he probably wouldn’t have heard her. He turned back towards her with the bandage, noticing her grimace and twitch her fingers.

“Hey Nat, you with me?” He inquired in a whisper. He wasn’t sure why he whispered, they were alone after all. He watched her move her head slightly for a few seconds before she opened her eyes, she blinked a few times adjusting to the light overheard. Even though he had dimed it to half way it still seemed to be too bright for her. 

“What the hell happened?” She asked slowly, reaching shakily with her left arm to feel the wound on her forehead. He caught her hand before she could, holding it for a moment before returning it back to the spot on her stomach. 

“Careful.” He told her, reaching up to place the bandage over her freshly cleaned wound. “You got pretty banged up down there.” She blinked a few times and looked around the room she was in, a brief look of confusion on her face. 

“Is Wanda okay?” She asked, locking her eyes with his. 

He shrugged. “I don’t really know, Sam and Vision are with her, said she was pretty shaken up. I am too. When you hit the ground and didn’t get up…” He trailed off, not being able to finish his sentence. “Anyway, you got a pretty bad concussion and some bruised ribs as well as that cut on your head, but you’ll be alright.” 

He waited for her to respond. But she didn’t say anything, just looked up at the ceiling above her. He could tell something was bothering her, he just couldn’t tell for sure what it was. Whatever it was he just wished she would tell him so he could try and help her. All he wanted to do was help her. He was about to suggest some pain meds but choked on his words when he saw the tears welling up in her eyes, about to spill over. 

“Nat.” He whispered softly, resting his hand gently on her shoulder. One of the tears slid down her cheek as she turned to face him. He could see the battle going on in her head about whether to let him in to her thoughts or not. As she searched his face he hoped that she would. 

“I shouldn’t be training them anymore, Steve.” She told him, her voice tight with the stress to keep the tears at bay. Her will to stay tough acting like a dam. “I keep reminding myself more and more of the trainers back at the Red Room, and I told myself I would never be like them.”

He didn’t know what to say. The rest of the team always joked about how good he could give a pep talk, but now he was floundering. He couldn’t find the words to express how he felt. He didn’t think she was anything like her old trainers, even though he had never met them himself. He just knew that Natasha had the heart and compassion that they didn’t. So instead of saying anything he crawled onto the bed and reached for Natasha.

As he pulled her into the safety of his arms, she didn’t resist. Instead she buried herself into him, clinging on to him, hands balled up into his shirt. And she cried. He didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to. He knew he just needed to be there to hold her when she needed it and to pick her up when she was down. And he would always be there, no matter what.


	22. Chapter 21: Extreme Climate

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ya'll I am so sorry it took me like a month

The first thought that went through her mind as she felt the cold sweep into her bones was that she was truly in trouble. Steve, James, and herself were basically stranded on the side of a mountain somewhere in Siberia. That hadn’t been the plan of course. They were on their way back from, except this last bit, a successful mission. A quick in and out to collect information from a KGB safe house in Uzlovaya, Russia. She didn’t mention it to Steve or James, but she had been to that town twice. Once when she was eleven-years-old and another time when she was fifteen-years-old. She had even been to the exact building the USB was kept, she had slept up in the attic with only a thin blanket to keep her warm her second visit to Uzlovaya. 

Now standing among the snow-covered fir trees that memory didn’t seem so far away. They had been flying a helicopter back when another one showed up behind them. She couldn’t be sure, but she’s almost certain it was from HYDRA. Meaning that the KGB and HYDRA are probably the same things, which wouldn’t be that far fetched. Luckily they were able to shoot down the helicopter, but not without taking damage to their own. Leaving them no choice but to parachute out of the flaming wreck. They were lucky to have all made it out unscathed. 

She was about halfway up a fir tree, using a knife she had tucked into her suit to cut down the parachute from the branches. The ropes were thick and it was taking a lot longer then she would have liked for her dull knife to slice through them. As the wind blew a chill into her face she briefly wondered where they might be. She glanced down through the branches to where Steve and James were going through what items they had, discovering what their chances out in the wild would be. But to her what they had wouldn’t matter, not even if James had a rocket launcher and a full turkey dinner hidden in his pocket. 

She knew from parachuting that all around them were trees and more trees. Nothing else. The sky above her had started to fill with dark grey clouds, the wind had already picked up. There was a snowstorm coming. She knew she would freeze to death before dehydration or starvation became a problem. There was at least one comfort about freezing to death, it wasn’t nearly as painfully desperate as dehydration or agonizingly slow as starvation.

As she continued to saw through the ropes she wondered if Steve or James had thought about how much of a problem the cold would be for her. They didn’t have to worry, the serum running through their veins made them immune to the cold. They would get out of here and be fine, she had no doubt about that. 

She finished cutting down the parachute just as the first snowflakes started to fall. She dropped the parachute down to the ground and stuffed the knife back into her suit. But she paused a moment before climbing down herself. She gave herself a moment to gaze up at the sky and watch the snowflakes drift towards the ground, some landing on the branches that got in their way, already covered in old snow. She felt a pang of nostalgia. Being so close to where she grew up and once again experiencing a true Russian winter reminded her of her time in the Red Room. Instead of reliving a memory of fear and hurt, she thought of a rare happy memory. 

She and her other classmates were still quite young, maybe three or four. They were taken outside into the snow to throw snowballs. She knows now that it was to help their aim and things like that, but at the time it was joyful. She vividly remembered balling up the snow in her hands, rolling it into a perfect ball and then tossing it at the nearest girl. The sounds of giggles filled the air in a place that was usually filled with screams. She wished she could go back to that moment and relive it, back when she was so young and didn’t know what was in store for her. 

She shook herself out of that memory and climbed down the tree, jumping the last few feet. She landed in the snow with a crunch and gathered up the parachute fabric. She swiftly wrapped the thin canvas around herself, creating a makeshift hood as well. The fabric wouldn’t do much to keep out the cold but at least it was something. She plastered a smile onto her face and turned around to face James and Steve. No matter how many times the others called him Bucky, the soldier would always be James to her. He was the one good thing from the Red Room, and even if he didn’t remember her, she would never forget the time they spent together. 

“Gonna be stuck in a storm here boys, we should get moving and see if we can find some shelter for the night.” She said to them, drawing their attention away from their meager supplies. 

“We’ve got a few knives, a lighter and a few energy bars and that’s about it,” Steve said, zipping up the backpack and sliding it over his shoulder. “Not going to last us very long up here.” 

“Hopefully we can find some shelter soon and then we can deal with the food and water problem,” James said grimly, walking past her and Steve. 

Steve glanced at her in her makeshift coat and then followed James as he led the way through the fir trees. She wrapped her arms around herself and looked up at the sky once more, snowflakes now falling thickly, then followed Steve, stepping in his footprints to try and keep her feet drier. Just like the thin coat, it wasn’t going to do much to help her. 

They walked at a good pace for about 2 hours before the problems started to become more of a problem. She had kept to the back, arms wrapped tight around herself, and trying to forget about the cold. The wind had picked up and was blowing snow in her face to the point where she could barely make out Steve or James. But she had managed to keep up with them. That is until now. 

The feeling in her feet and hands had disappeared about half an hour ago. That was bearable, but now her arms and legs had gotten stiff, to the point where she had to think about every step she took so that she wouldn’t fall. Steve had started to glance back at her more frequently now, just confirming the fact that she was slowing them down. The thing that worried her the most was that her vision had started to go black around the edges, signs of hyperthermia. She probably only had a few hours left. 

She was able to keep going for about 20 minutes more, but then her frozen body wouldn’t listen to her anymore. She stumbled and in her state, she wasn’t able to catch herself before she hit the ground. The snow against her bare skin felt hot and she wanted to stay there. But a hand against her back reminded her that she couldn’t. She rolled to her back to look up at Steve and James above her. Steve’s worried face was close to her’s, framed by the white sky.

“Natasha?” Steve exclaimed, reaching a hand up to her face. She wanted to say something back to him but she couldn’t form the words. It was like they were stuck in the back of her throat. 

“Natasha stay awake okay? We’ll find somewhere out of the storm soon.” Steve told her confidently. But she knew he had no idea if they would find shelter soon. They most likely wouldn’t. He was just trying to pretend she would be alright. She felt his arms underneath her as he lifted her up and held her close to his chest. She noticed that James was now carrying the backpack. 

Steve was warm so she shoved her face into his chest, trying to stay out of the wind. She was so cold and tired and it was hard to stay awake. She listened to Steve and James talk for a few minutes but she couldn’t make out what they were saying. Right before she closed her eyes and gave herself over to sleep she heard James say something in Russian close to her ear.

“Все будет хорошо наталья”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Russian translation: Все будет хорошо наталья = You'll be okay, Natalia

**Author's Note:**

> If you really like one and want a long story on it I can do that as well :) Also I love to see your comments and stuff


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